[FRIAM] Off the wall question about turbulence

glen gepropella at gmail.com
Tue Dec 12 13:51:08 EST 2023


FWIW, here's some more kewl acoustic emission:

https://kuaishen.bandcamp.com/album/stridulation-amplified-compositions-with-the-stridulatory-organ-of-atta-cephalotes

> The compositions are recordings of the acoustic vibrations, scientifically known as stridulations, which are produced by leaf-cutter ants (species Atta cephalotes, native of the Neotropics in South America) in order to modulate their messages as part of their social communication. The recordings were engraved in a vinyl record, a medium which is in fact a polymer derivative of the organic polymer, which naturally composes the exoskeleton of ants and most insects on the planet, i.e., chitin.
> 
> The ants produce these acoustic vibrations by using the stridulatory organ, which consists of a sharp scraper located on the posterior border of the post-petiole, the plectrum, and of a file of transverse ridges located on the upper surface of the anteriormost part of the abdominal segment, the pars stridens. When the abdomen is jerked up and down, the plectrum rubs against the pars stridens, producing a stridulation between 2kHz-46kHz depending on the size of the ant: this physical rubbing produces acoustic energy which is in itself a mechanism analogous to dragging a vinyl record back and forth on a turntable, producing what is commonly known as scratching. Thus, this reveals the connection between scratching, as an aesthetic expression created by human culture, and the stridulation phenomena produced by ants as a modulation mechanism for social communication.
> 
> This if the first time (as far as I am aware of) in the history of insect bioacoustics, that the sound of this species of leaf-cutter ants has been captured, engraved and mastered in a vinyl.
> 
> "Stridulation Amplified: Compositions with the stridulatory organ of Atta cephalotes" was produced for the Manifesta 9th Biennial exhibition in 2012 as part of Kuai Shen's reactive sound installation, "0h!m1gas: biomimetic stridulation environment", which shows my leaf-cutter ant family being monitored with open computer vision and amplified by piezo-microphones connected to a pair of turntables which produces scratching sounds using this same vinyl. 
> credits
> released November 8, 2017
> 
> The field recording was made at the Reserva Natural Otonga, in Sto. Domingo de los Tsachilas, Ecuador. The production costs for the vinyl were partially sponsored by Kunststiftung NRW. 



-- 
ꙮ Mɥǝu ǝlǝdɥɐuʇs ɟᴉƃɥʇ' ʇɥǝ ƃɹɐss snɟɟǝɹs˙ ꙮ



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