MSOE students will record seals underwater conversation
| Published: 11/21/2005 |
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What do seals say to each other while underwater? Three MSOE engineering students intend to find out by using a hydrophone, an underwater microphone at the Milwaukee County Zoo on Tuesday, Nov. 22 at 11 a.m.
"The sound is picked up by the underwater microphone, amplified, and fed into a laptop, so that it can be heard and analyzed," said Dr. Harry Rollings, who is advising the students.
The laptop is equipped with Goldwave software that allows for the elimination of specific as well as random background noise in order to "clean up" the sounds from the animals. It also allows for a visual display of the amplitudes and frequencies of the sound in a variety of sounds and colors.
The sounds that will be recorded are typical of seals, as well as other animals, as they communicate or search for food or other objects underwater, a process known as echolocation.