Singing cells, art, science and the noise in between - Users - UCLA

Although a yeast cell vibrates with a frequency of about 1000 Hz, the amplitude of the
oscillation is too small to create a sound wave that can be heard by the human ear. The
electrical signals of the AFM tip can be amplified. The vibrations of the cell can then be
distributed through audio speakers. This process is not much different from reading data
on an audio CD and amplifying the signals with a stereo system. The amplifying
procedure intensifies the weak volume of the yeast cell sound but does not change the
pitch or character of the sound itself. The sound of the first vibrating cell to be discovered
can be described as a clear, high-pitched tone.
In that sense, the AFM can be regarded as a new type of musical instrument. To prove
that cellular motion is in fact a metabolically driven feature of the living cell, Prof.
Gimzewski and Pelling created a number of experiments. The results show that
manipulating the cell with chemicals causes a change of oscillation and, therefore, a
change in sound. Isopropanol (rubbing alcohol) for example, will slow the frequency
down. A chemical such as sodium azide will kill the cell, causing the emitted frequency
to die away, leaving only noise.
2.3 Small sounds, small instruments and the music of the universe
Knock on the sky and listen to the sound.
Zen Saying
For a long time musicians have been inspired by microscopic life-forms and the
fascinating structures of the smallest building blocks of the universe. Sound artists have
played a special role as pioneers in the relationship of art, science and technology, since
they were amongst the earliest to integrate technology, utilize personal computers and
enter the scientific discourse about sound and hearing. The fact that vision is generally
regarded dominant over hearing in western culture, and sound exploration is relatively
underrepresented in both art and science, places the musician in a particularly
challenging, but very potential position within the art-science discussion. Accustomed to
this traditional dominance of vision, the sound-artist might be able to draw attention to
the misrepresentation of all other senses in general. And since the study of sound includes
the abstract, physical and psychological levels, it naturally brings an understanding of the
entanglement of these realms.
The deconstruction of sound into its smallest parts and the mimicking of biological
structures to create sound lies within a long history of artistic exploration of the natural.
The media artists Kurt Hentschläger and Ulf Langheinrich, known under the name of
Granular Synthesis, split audio and video sequences into the smallest possible particles,
creating tiny sound grains. 5 In their installations, they re-arrange, loop and mix these
synthesized fragments of audio and video and then restructure them freely outside the
time continuum of the original material. Thomas Feuerstein writes in his article about the
Granular Synthesis installation Modell3:
5 Granular Synthesis Homepage: http://www.granularsynthesis.info/
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