The LightSound Project is part of a growing effort to make astronomy more accessible to the blind and low-vision (BLV) community. In addition to tactile models and Braille books, sonification (the process of converting data or signals into auditory pitches) is another important way to increase accessibiltiy. The LightSound is a handheld device that uses Arduino technology to convert ambient light brightness into sound, as a way to make solar eclipses more accessible to BLV individuals.
The first LightSound prototype was developed by Daniel Davis, Wanda Diaz-Merced, and Allyson Bieryla at Harvard University for the August 2017 Great American Solar Eclipse. In anticipation of the 2019 and 2020 South American eclipses, I joined the project in 2018 and redesigned the device to improve both sensor and sound capabilities. I also developed several Python scripts for users of all coding levels to log plot the data collected from the device. We were funded by an International Astronomical Union (IAU) 100 Special Projects grant to build and distribute 20 LightSounds to Chile and Argentina for the eclipses.
In preparation for the 2023 and 2024 annular and total solar eclipses, our team has been running workshops and make-a-thons to distribute several hundred devices across the path of the eclipses. This work has been supported by grants from the IAU, American Astronomical Society (AAS), and the National Science Foundation (NSF).
Learn more:
- Project Webpage: https://astrolab.fas.harvard.edu/LightSound.html
- LightSound GitHub: https://github.com/soleyhyman/LightSound2.0