Planet Earth Emits Cosmic Scream

Though our planet has long been known to emit a mysterious low hum that scientists have postulated might be generated by oceans or winds or other natural phenomena, new research shows that it also emits a powerful array of radiation-spawned, high-pitched chirps and whistles, that shoot out like a beam from the earth’s magnetic field deep into space. This means that anyone out there listening would be able to hear it and pinpoint earth’s location, and we can do the same:

The Auroral Kilometric Radiation (AKR), as it is called, is beamed out in a narrow plane, as if someone had put a mask over a torch and left a slit for the radiation to escape.

This flat beam could be detected by aliens who’ve figured this process out, the researchers say. The knowledge could also be used by Earth’s astronomers to detect planets around other stars, if they can build a new radio telescope big enough for the search. They could also learn more about Jupiter and Saturn by studying AKR, which should emit from the auroral activity on those worlds, too.

Thankfully, our ionosphere blocks the sounds from reaching earth:

The radio waves are blocked by the ionosphere, a charged layer atop our atmosphere, so they do not reach Earth. That’s good, because the out-of-this-world radio waves are 10,000 times stronger than even the strongest military signal, the researchers said, and they would overwhelm all radio stations on the planet.

Hear them for yourself, here. Someone needs to put that shit into some IDM. Give the aliens something to grind on when they finally get here, fuckers.

Tags: akr, Aliens, auroral activity, chirps, ionosphere, jupiter, magnetic field, natural phenomena, oceans, planet earth, radiation, radio stations, radio telescope, radio waves, whistles