TUESDAY, JUNE 3
Orto Botanico dell’Università di Torino
6 pm
3 – 15 June 2025
Hours:
- Mon-Fri : 10 A.M. – 4P.M.
- Saturday: 2:30 P.M. – 7 P.M.
- Sunday : 10 A.M. – 7 P.M.
The Power of Refreshing Sound and Trees
An Installation of Sound in Botany and Neuroscience by Vincenzo Guarnieri
As water evaporates from a leaf’s surface, heat is absorbed and the ambient temperature falls. This phenomenon is invisible, like that produced by certain sounds that our brain transforms into a sense of freshness.
Trees are nature’s air conditioners. For example, they cool the area in their shadow. Most of the water absorbed by the roots is lost by transpiration at the leaves where water molecules absorb heat and evaporate into the air, thus lowering the surrounding temperature. One cubic meter of water can cool the area around a plant by about 2 °C. Trees provide this ecosystem service 24h/24h but we don’t notice it since it’s invisible and free of charge. Beneath the old apricot tree in the Botanical Garden of the University of Turin certain sounds can be heard. Neuroscience is studying hearing in the perception of temperature. Some sounds can make us feel hot and others cold, depending on the physical properties of the sound waves and how our brain processes them. These processes are being studied with AI-generated sounds that create a sensation of coolness. The study is ongoing and visitors can take part in it. A refreshing shower of sound can help us reflect on how humans are made and how transpiration occurs in trees. The installation is part of the project entitled “Flussi arborei” created by Vincenzo Guarnieri and Sebastiano Barbieri with Renato Bruni (Botanical Garden, University of Parma).
Credits
Author: Vincenzo Guarnieri
Scientific committee: Massimiliano Zampini – Centro Interdipartimentale Mente/Cervello (CIMeC), Università di Trento
Production of sound: Matteo Spanio e Antonio Rodà – Centro di Sonologia Computazionale (CSC), Università di Padova
Installation and service: Fabio Lombardo (VI.MA)
Thanks are due Charles Spence (University of Oxford) for his assistance
