By Phil Vinter
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Edvard Munch's famous 1895 painting The Scream: Scientists hope to find out whether screams can be heard in space
'In space no one can hear you scream'... or can they?
The veracity of the famous tagline from Ridley Scott's 1979 sci-fi blockbuster is to be put to the test next month when the sounds of human screams are played in space.
A group of Cambridge scientists called Cambridge University Space Flight have invited members of the public to upload videos of themselves screaming to YouTube and the best ten will then be downloaded to a Google Android smartphone and launched into space on a tiny satellite
Once in orbit the sounds of the screams will be played through thephone's speaker and whatever audio comes out will be recorded and beamed back to earth.
The results will be analysed by scientists before being made available on the internet to finally answer the question of whether or not ear-piercing sounds can be heard thousands of miles above the Earth.
The Scream in Space application is the brainchild of a team of Cambridge University scientists who won a competition in 2011 to design an application for the world's first smartphone satellite called STRaND-1.
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The phrase 'in space no one can hear you scream' was the tagline for the 1979 movie Alien
A spokesman for the Scream in Space team said: 'In coming up with this idea, we thought about what features the Android phone has which are not usually present on conventional satellites - and naturally the speaker and microphone are two such components. It would seem a shame not to leverage the power of these additions, and so the idea was born.'
'Whilst the conclusion of this experiment may seem clear to many, it is our hope that through this investigation thousands of people worldwide can learn more about several aspects of physics (including orbits, acoustics and much more) and get excited about the field of satellite technology.'
The nanosatellite phone will contain a Google Android phone
STRaND-1 was created by engineers at Surrey University using advanced commercial off-the-shelf components found in phones and is the world's first smartphone nanosatellite.
Shaun Kenyon, SSTL Project Manager for STRaND-1 said: 'Mobile phones pack lots of components used in satellites - sensors, cameras, GPS, batteries, accelerometers, compasses, data storage - but at a fraction of the size, weight and cost.
'What would be cool is to show that all of this capability, squeezed into something as small as a phone, can still work in space.
'We're not taking it apart; we're not gutting it; we're not taking out the printed circuit boards and re-soldering them into our satellite - we're flying it as is and, in fact, we're going to have another camera on the satellite so we can take a picture of the phone because we want to operate the screen and have some good images of that as well.
'We have no real idea how much will work in space - we are carrying out extensive ground testing, to be followed up by an in-orbit test campaign.'
The phone will run on Android's powerful open-source operating system. A powerful computer, built at the Surrey Space Centre, will test the vital statistics of the phone once in space.
The computer will check which components of the phone are working normally and will relay images and messages back to Earth via a radio system.
The STRaND-1 Smartphone Nanosatellite in which the Android phone will be encased
Once all the tests are complete, the plan is to switch off the micro computer and the smartphone will be used to operate parts of the satellite.
People are being invited to record video clips of themselves screaming and then upload them to YouTube ahead of the mission take off in nine days.
As the entries are played another camera will capture photos of the moment, and a shot of the 'screamer's face screaming in space will be sent back to Earth.
For more information about how to enter your scream in the competition go to www.screaminspace.com
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