While analyzing acoustic data from the Mariana Archipelago, Angela Szesciorka (Oregon State University) noticed something funny: a signal unlike any other she’d seen. It showed up over and over, and only seemed to occur at night. In this episode, we talk to Szesciorka about this mystery call and what animal possibly made it.
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Recent advances in technology have allowed scientists to gather larger quantities of acoustic data from locations more remote than ever before. As a result, the study of animal sounds can be used to inform species or habitat conservation and natural resource management practices in new and exciting ways. In this episode, we talk to Aaron Rice of Cornell University about how acoustics can be used to advance conservation efforts, as well as how folks outside of large research universities can take part in efforts to help save the planet with science.
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Metamaterials have been a hot topic in the acoustics community since the late 1990s, but there’s no consensus among researchers as to what a metamaterial actually is or when they first came about. Christina Naify (University of Texas – Austin) took a deep dive into the literature about metamaterials and then posed the question to an audience of researchers in a session at the ASA conference in Chicago. In this episode, we talk to her about what came up during this discussion.
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The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health’s (NIOSH) recommended exposure limit for occupational noise is often cited as the upper limit for loudness in all situations– but that’s not actually the case. Worse, the limit may not even fit modern ears, which face a barrage of loud sound in and out of the workplace, starting at an early age. In this episode, we talk to Daniel Fink of Quiet Coalition about how NIOSH’s recommended exposure limit for occupational noise impacts even those of us in quiet workplaces, and why the limit needs to be revised downwards.
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Traditionally, speech researchers have asked participants to classify speakers on a binary scale for gender. However, as our understanding of gender changes, so must our research methods. In this episode, we talk to Brandon Merritt (University of Texas – El Paso) about their research into updating research protocols to better encompass a diversity of genders and gain a more nuanced understanding of listeners’ perception of speakers’ identity.
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