Tractor beams have hit the big time. A newly constructed device generates a beam of concentrated sound that, for the first time, exerts a continuous, perceptible tug on objects large enough to see.

Researchers recently created an acoustic hologram, or a 3D sound field projected onto a 2D space, which can be used as acoustic tweezers, cages and twisters that manipulate objects as they levitate in ...

3D-printed motorcycle earmuffs that suppress traffic and wind noise while amplifying car horns, and objects encoded with unique audio barcodes are just a couple of the devices that could be on the way ...

An artist's rendering shows an acoustic hologram trapping a particle over a levitation device. Courtesy Asier Marzo, Bruce Drinkwater and Sriram Subramanian It's no Mattel hoverboard. But a device ...

Seeing an object at the same time that you hear sound coming from somewhere else can lead to the 'ventriloquist illusion' and its aftereffect, but research suggests that simply imagining the object ...

A new project from Disney Research can recognize various objects in videos — cows, cars, very small rocks — and add appropriate sounds — “Mooo!”, “Vroom!”, a witch’s cackle — automatically. The system ...

Musical lodestar, creative anomaly: Jacques Auberger doesn’t look like anyone you’ve ever met. It’s not so much his sartorial bent—which is only moderately esoteric—as the hair on his head. If a ...

Smithsonian Institution, Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, 600 Maryland Ave., S.W., Suite 2001, Washington ...