Starship Asterisk*

Can you hear sound on the moon?

starsurfer wrote: ↑Mon Jul 16, 2018 11:54 am
Can you hear sound on the moon?

Through the ground, perhaps, ...very poorly.

starsurfer wrote: ↑Mon Jul 16, 2018 11:54 am Can you hear sound on the moon?

There is a lunar atmosphere, so there are sound waves. Far below the human detection threshold, I'm sure. And I don't recommend removing your helmet to test that!

Chris Peterson wrote: ↑Mon Jul 16, 2018 2:11 pm

starsurfer wrote: ↑Mon Jul 16, 2018 11:54 am
Can you hear sound on the moon?

There is a lunar atmosphere, so there are sound waves.
Far below the human detection threshold, I'm sure. And I don't recommend removing your helmet to test that!

Note that the (noble gas: argon/neon/helium) lunar atmospheric pressure is only ~3×10⁻¹² hPa
such that the gas mean free path is approximately equal to the diameter of the Moon itself

Under such circumstances an audio speaker can still generate pulses of gas atoms; however:

• 1) the pulses will only propagate at the fastest speed of the speaker diaphragm motion,
  
  2) while the pulse structure will rapidly degrade at roughly the nominal speed of sound
  • (due to random gas particle motion).