The Entire Light Curve of the K2-187 Exoplanets Converted Into Music

The 4 planets of K2-187 were discovered by looking for slight dips in the brightness as each one passes in front of their star (the ’transit’ method). This data was collected by the Kepler Telescope’s K2 mission and we have converted every measurement into a musical note by assigning the dimmer measurements to lower notes. We used the harmonic minor scale to match the actual harmony that these planets produce when their motion is converted into musical pitches (see link below). Although many transits can be easily seen and heard, some are hidden by the star’s own natural variability making planet detection a tough task, especially for the smaller planets (the innermost planet is only 1.3 times larger than Earth). The entire piece represents about 75 days of observation with a measurement being taken every 30 seconds.   Listen to the real harmony of K2-187: This system’s validation was published in November 2018 by J. Livingston et al: