The challenge - GE engineers and University of Wisconsin–Madison student, Chris Nguyen, were challenged to silence temporarily, the famous bell that signals daily prayers in the temple and nearby community.
Why? While residents are used to the bell ringing, it often wakes sleeping babies prompting some local moms to ponder – could there be a way, in the future, to mute the bell during parts of the day?
The Response
Using tech similar to that used in a GE subsea acoustic leak detector, the GE team attempted to create “destructive interference” - when two sound waves of equal frequency and opposite phase, cancel each other out – watch the video to see if peace and quiet was achieved at the temple.
Taking on the Impossible
UM is a campaign where the science behind GE’s industrial products is creatively showcased in “impossible challenges” taken on by GE researchers, engineers and others. Whether it’s trying to catch lightening in a bottle, protecting a snowball in a foundry furnace, and more, the experiments, and UM videos, demonstrate what can be done when GE experts from various industries collaborate to share knowledge and expertise to prove that nothing is impossible.