A team of researchers at MIT used computers and mathematical algorithms to turn the frequencies of a vibrant spider web into music. The researchers presented their results on April 12, 2021, at the spring meeting of the American Chemical Society.
Markus Buehler of MIT is the project’s lead investigator. He said in a statement:
The spider lives in a vibrant rope environment. I don’t see very well, so I feel my world through vibrations, which have different frequencies.
Such vibrations occur, for example, when the spider stretches a silk thread during construction or when the wind or a caught fly moves the canvas. Spiders are sensitive to disorders, which they detect with their feet.
Buehler, who has long been interested in music, wondered if he could extract rhythms and songs from the vibrant threads of spider webs. Given this goal, the team scanned a natural spider web with a laser to capture 2D cross sections, then used computerized algorithms to reconstruct the 3D network of the web. The team assigned different sound frequencies to the strings on the web, creating “notes” that they combined into models based on the 3D structure of the web to generate songs. The researchers then created a harp-like instrument to play spider music. Buehler told Reuters:
Spiders are a completely different animal. What I see or feel is not actually audible or visible to the human eye or human ear. Therefore, by transposing it, we begin to experience this.
The cross-sectional images (presented in different colors) of a spider web were combined in this 3D image and translated into music. Image by Isabelle Su and Markus Buehler / SciTechDaily.
The team is also interested in learning how to communicate with spiders in their own language. They recorded the vibrations of the web produced when the spiders performed various activities, such as building a web, communicating with other spiders or sending yard signals. Although the frequencies sound similar to the human ear, a machine learning algorithm has correctly classified sounds into different activities. Buehler said:
We are now trying to generate synthetic signals to practically speak the spider’s language. If we expose them to certain patterns of rhythms or vibrations, can we affect what they do and start communicating with them? These are really exciting ideas.
Conclusion: Researchers have transposed into music the complex structure of a spider’s web. Listen here.
Through ScienceDaily
Via Reuters
