News6-For the first time, scientists have heard strange sounds called ‘dust devils’ from the surface of Mars.
The sound recording of the small tornado and dust, launched by metro.co.uk, swept across the surface of the Martian planet. The sound was like an alien whirlwind, captured and sent back by the explorer Perseverance. According to the researchers, this is the first time this phenomenon has been heard and can be used to better understand the planet Mars.
“We can learn a lot more with sound than with other instruments,” said Roger Wiens, a professor of earth, atmospheric and planetary sciences at the Purdue University School of Science who led the team of scientists.
He explained: “They read periodically. Microphones allow us to sample, not quite at the speed of sound, but nearly 100,000 times per second. This helps us better understand what Mars is like.”
The findings are reported in a new paper titled “The sound of a Martian dust devil,” published in the journal Nature Communications. **Also Read: Exporting Strawberry Milk And Coffee Worth Around IDR 15.6 Billion To North Korea, This Singaporean Man Is Jailed
NASA’s Perseverance rover landed on Mars in 2020 and brought with it the first working microphone to the planet’s surface. It’s one of several sensors in the rover’s “head,” known as the SuperCam, which also includes a camera and spectrometer.
The microphone is turned on for about three minutes every few days. This means that luck can determine what gets caught. Since deploying to Mars, the Perseverance rover has captured evidence of nearly 100 “dust devils.”
The sound recordings can be used in conjunction with other data to better understand the atmosphere and weather on Mars, showing how the planet has small storms with strong and light winds. So, astronauts don’t have to worry about strong winds pressing down on the rover’s location.
But the strong winds also appear to have been enough to prevent sand from accumulating on the equipment’s solar panels, which may have helped previous rover aircraft last longer than expected.
“Those rover teams would experience a slow drop in power over a period of days or weeks, then a peak. That’s when the wind cleans the solar panels,” said Professor Wiens. (ilj/bbs)
