A team from the British Antarctic Survey, the UK’s national polar research institute, has released an album built from radio waves and biomusic sounds captured by an antenna in Antarctica.Ad 0:00 Click for sound 0:00 / 0:00 Scientist Nigel Meredith partnered with Cambridge-based multimedia artist Diana Scarborough and composer Kim Cunio to form the ‘Sounds of Space Project,’ which has released several albums since 2020.
Infinitas Formas marks their ninth and it samples field recordings from the R.R.S.Sir David Attenborough’s 2025 Antarctic research voyage, including open water, wind, penguins, seals and the ambient hums of a vessel at sea.
Meredith has also spent years using the Halley Research Station’s antenna to study space weather, picking up radio waves generated by solar winds and lightning that travel along Earth’s magnetic field lines.Many of those signals fall within the audible frequency range, meaning they can be converted directly into sound.
He incorporated those sounds into Infinitas Formas as well.Lightning-generated bursts called “sferics” carry a rough, campfire-style crackle, and when those pulses travel long distances they warp into ringing tones called “tweeks,” according to Science News.
Chorus waves, produced when solar-driven electrons enter the magnetosphere, mirror a bird chorus and are strongest in the early morning.“It’s a bit like entering the film set of a 1960s sci-fi movie,” the trio said.
You can listen to Infinitas Formas below via Bandcamp....