In space no one can hear you scream, right? Help the STRaND-1 smartphone nanosatellite test it

By Chris Parsons  | Oct 28 2012 | 6:03 pm  | 9 Comments

Some of you may remember the tag line from Alien but now Cambridge University Spaceflight is looking to put it all to the test. Using the STRaND-1 smartphone nanosatellite that runs Android and built by the University of Surrey's Space Centre and SSTL, the STRaND-1 will carry the videos submitted by folks like yourself into outer space all in an effort to test the hypothesis that in space no one can hear you scream.

If you're looking to help out, your mission is simple. Upload a 10 second video to YouTube and submit it to the project website. Once submitted, you can get your friends and family to vote for it to give you a chance of being one of the 10 winning videos included in the mission. Even if you don't enter, you should check out the project link below. On its own, the STRaND-1 smartphone nanosatellite is a pretty cool piece of technology.

Source: Scream In Space! Thanks, Ed!

Chris Parsons Writer

"Born and raised in Nova Scotia, Canada. Chris is fluent in all mobile languages and loves anything with a power button."

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There are 9 comments. Add yours.

84guy says:

so. all this time. 60+ years in space.. and noone has tested it? im pretty sure you can't. being that sound requires substance. and space is the absence of substance, and im pretty sure nasa has already stuck a mic and speaker in space to test that.

mwara244 says:

Pulsar's give off sound. Sound is a radio wave just like light, microwaves. It's the reference of what form of listening device will pick up the sound. If they are referring to the human ear drum, than no, because it needs an atmosphere to work properly. Also sound travels farther faster under water, and sea life is designed to pick it up differently, so maybe try sending fish up to the ISS for tests.
I imagine it really depends on the amount of power and distance the waves are being generated with to the receptor of the listening device.

aybbtu says:

Sound Is NOT a radio wave you idiot.... sound is the vibration of molecules that are generated and transmitted through air or other gas or liquids. Thats why we have EARS instead of Radio antennas on the side of our head to HEAR with.... Oy Vea! My 7 year old nephew knows better than you; he pointed to this comment and laughed! Please go earn your G.E.D. and stop watching star-trek 4 the voyage home constantly.

Brian_d says:

Seems like a waste. Even the astronauts who went to skylab - which was essentially a large empty Saturn rocket fuel tank - have said that they had a hard time hearing each other due to low air pressure inside the space station. No air, no sound.

funkylogik says:

no medium, no soundwaves!
its nice that android is in space (is it true its based on Nexus S?)
but ill have nightmares of an iOs sattelite sent to test something relevant :(

The Real X Dawg says:

Probably end up iLost in the sun.

still1 says:

with current apple maps you could end up lost in sun too.

Shadowriver says:

"The Scream in Space app will make full use of the smartphone's speakers. Testing the theory 'in space no-one can hear you scream, made popular in the 1979 film 'Alien', the app will allow the public to upload videos of themselves screaming in a creative way to an allocated website. The most popular videos will be played on the phone while in orbit and the scream recorded using the smartphone's microphone. "

.....are those guys are not serious... if they are ,then they are "f****** morons" (how Linus Torvalds would call them reading about it) ;p i know they might do that for fun, but i think would be better if they do something more interesting.

dhughes says:

Yeah you can hardly hear the noise out of smartphone speakers now, so I am sure it will be hard to hear one playing a sound in space.