Jatila van der Veen 1
Ryan McGee 1 John Moreland
2
1: University of California Santa Barbara
2: Purdue University Calumet
Looking Back to the Dawn of Time
Interactive Mission Simulation:
Teaching about Planck and solar
system astronomy in VR
Visualization and Sonification of the
CMB: Using Media Arts Technology
to teach about the physics of the
early universe using the analogy of
the physics or sound
Looking out in space =
Looking back in time
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Launched May 14, 2009 from French Guiana by Arianne V rocket
Orbit around L2, 1.5 million km from Earth
Cooled to within 1 tenth of a degree above absolute zero
Designed to map the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) with
a sensitivity of a few millionths of a degree Kelvin, and an angular
resolution as fine as 5 arc minutes on the sky, in 9 frequencies.
• Goals:
– extract essentially all the information contained in the CMB
temperature anisotropies, with which to constrain models of how
the universe originated and evolved
– map the polarization of the CMB in both intensity & direction
– map the foreground sources in greatest detail and coverage so as to
understand how the CMB photons interact with the foreground
sources as well as remove them accurately from the CMB maps
Originally developed in
the Center for Immersive
Visualization and
Simulations
at Purdue University
Calumet
Runs in Windows and
Linux
Works with PCs in 2D
and 5 3D formats
The PMVR embodies the characteristics of a
successful VR environment (Zeltzer, 1992):
Autonomy : The mission and the planets behave
independently of the user;
Interaction : The simulation responds consistently to the
user’s input regarding navigation, scale of the display, and
passage of time;
Presence : The user gets a sense of being ‘inside’ the Solar
System, even in the 2D mode on a PC.
PMVR supports learning objectives for introductory astronomy
and cosmology component of “Astro 101”
•Kepler’s Laws
•Earth-Moon interactions
•Distances, relative sizes,
& relative motion in the
Solar System
•Provides ‘back story’ of a
live mission
above: Visible light view of the galaxy
right: Microwave view of the galaxy
Targets of Opportunity:
Jupiter-Venus-Mercury line up
in the winter sky, 2012
1. As guided ‘tour’ in an immersive theater by
instructor
2. As independent exploration by students on a PC
or in a lab with individual HMD’s
3. Couple with real-world field observations
4. As an assessment tool, in that students can
record demos
5. Plans for testing with students in the PUC VisLab in
Fall 2012
6. Planks for testing with Astro 1 students at UCSB
Imagine a multi-user simulation that runs in
3D with Kinect 360,
in which students can learn astronomy by exploring!
PI: van der Veen; Collaborators: Lubin,
Kuchera-Morin; Ryan McGee, Basak
Alper, R.J. Duran, PhD students in
Media Arts Technology at UCSB
the transformation of data relations into perceived
relations in an acoustic signal for the purposes of
facilitating communication or interpretation.

Why sonification is appropriate for understanding
the CMB: Because the very early universe was an
expanding plasma that was permeated by
gravity-driven pressure waves – i.e., SOUND.
As we understand today, for the first 380,000 years of its
existence the young expanding universe was filled with a plasma
of tightly coupled photons and charged particles. Dark matter,
which does not interact electromagnetically, collected first in
pockets, and is believed to have initiated the growth of acoustic
waves in the photon-baryon fluid.
Left: Animation of stones dropping into pond
analogy with dark matter initiating acoustic
waves (WMAP). Below: 1D schematic of
fundamental and higher harmonics (W.Hu).
Just as the power spectrum of the tones produced by a musical instrument is
determined by the characteristic properties of that instrument, similarly the
angular power spectrum of the CMB is controlled by the properties of the
universe, characterized by ~30 cosmological parameters.
Distance the longest wave could
have crossed at recombination =
vt = ( .6c) (380,000 years)
= 2 x 1021 meters, or ~ 228,000
light years = half a wavelength
 Fundamental wavelength was
456,000 light years, which
corresponds to a frequency of
7 x 10-14 Hz, or slightly more than
49 octaves below the lowest note on
the piano (27 Hz).
Go down 49 more octaves !!
1o ~ l = 200
200 Hz
sound: zooming in
on the harmonics,
one at a time, using
narrow peak width
As the user slides
between model
universes, the power
spectrum, map, and
sounds change. With
the audio controls,
you can change the
timbre, and zoom in
on one or more
harmonic.
Students can compare the look and sound
of different model universes.
a) 70% dark energy – best estimate
b) 89% dark energy – too much
c) 10% dark energy – too little
lambda = .89
baryon = .05
dark matter = .05
Curricula which support utilizing our CMB simulation
in Astro 101 classes:
Cosmology Curricular Companion
(B. Partridge)
Labs for a Lambda-Dominated Universe
(J. van der Veen & P. Lubin)
http://planck.caltech.edu/epo/epo-higherEdu.html
http://planck.caltech.edu/epo/epo-informalEdu.html