The vacuum of space should be silent. Where atoms are too far apart to allow sound waves to propagate, any screams are stifled before they begin. However, this does not mean that the sound cannot be achieved. In fact, if we could hear them, some objects in the solar system would emit a deafening hum.

We can’t hear the others… but we can transmute the plasma waves rippling around them. Plasma waves occur when electrons become trapped in magnetic field lines around large objects such as planets and spiral downward.

If we convert plasma wave frequencies into sound, we can hear their eerie screams and screams.

Every object in the solar system has its own sounds. The Sun, for example, must be positively rumbling as its surface is awash with ever-rising and sinking convection cells larger than the state of Texas.

Scientists estimate that if sound could travel through space, we could hear the Sun as a sustained roar of an ear-splitting 100 decibels.

Astronomer Karl Gute Jansky recorded the first sounds from space in 1932. He built a rotating radio telescope, nicknamed the “Jansky Carousel”, designed to detect a specific frequency range of radio waves. As his data began to flow, he discovered that Jansky’s constant hissing sound in the background was not a random noise, but the sound of the heart of the Milky Way galaxy.

As we began sending probes into space with the launch of Sputnik in 1957, we began to receive more data collected by the instruments on those probes. These include devices designed to capture invisible forms of light and waves in plasma in the sometimes chaotic environment around the solar system’s planets.

Radio waves are not sound; they are a form of light in which sound data can be encoded and converted back into sound when received by a receiver. Cell phones work the same way. The technology of converting electromagnetic waves into sound is quite advanced.

We’ve even heard radio waves in space that scientists have translated into spoken language. Radio waves from Earth leaked into space, but this shows the accuracy of the data collected by these devices.

Plasma waves orbiting planets can also produce interesting chirping and whistling sounds known as choruses. Earth sounds may be a bit reminiscent of birds or whales. Saturn, with its complex system of moons and rings, resembles the soundtrack of a chilling science fiction movie from the 1950s.

Even Jupiter’s moons have their own complex sound profiles. Europa and Ganymede have been noted to emit plasma sounds reminiscent of robot flashes and beeps. And Jupiter’s powerful ultraviolet aurora is simply breathtaking. Mars doesn’t have much of a magnetic field, but we know what its winds sound like. Both the InSight lander and the Perseverance rover recorded the haunting, lonely sounds of Martian winds as dust devils danced across the dusty surface.

It’s not just the solar system either. Space is vast and strange, and converting light into sound can help scientists uncover hidden details they may have overlooked. So if you really want to feel small, you can listen to the sound of a supermassive black hole whizzing through space 250 million light-years away. Source