Spacecraft data is sweet music to Nasa scientists

Data beamed back to Earth from Nasa’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has been used to make a piece of music to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its launch.

The three-minute work is based on information captured by a special telescope aboard the craft, which is designed to identify protons, alpha particles and heavier nuclei in space.

Scientists used data, stretching back to 1977 to create a melody that follows the journey of Voyager 1. Each number, representing an average 26-day measurement received by Nasa’s space physics data facility from the telescope, called a low-energy charged article (LECP) instrument, is converted into a musical note.