Signals

Signals vs. Noise

A (maybe The) job of science is to decode what is signal and what is noise.

Sometimes it's obvious, most of the time it's not.

21 years of temperatures in NYC

Consider the average temperature in NYC for the last 21 years.

There are many ways of parsing this.

What's the signal? And what's the noise?

Sound / Tones

Spectrum Analyzer: Link

CMB, data from 3 different satellites

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESA

CMB, data from 3 different satellites

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESA

CMB, data from 3 different satellites

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESA

Temperature

Yearly Cycles

Arduino Demo

Mission: Record Good Time series data

        /*
        CCNY PHYS 37100 
        Experiment 4b
        More accurate timings
        */
        
        unsigned long currentTime = 0;
        unsigned long lastTime = 0;
        const unsigned long intervalBetweenData = 1000;
        
        void setup() {
           // make the serial talk faster
           // be sure to also change this in the serial monitor window settings
            Serial.begin(500000);
        }
        
        
        void loop() {
          // get the current time in microseconds
          currentTime =  micros();
          
          if (currentTime - lastTime >= intervalBetweenData ) {
            int sensorValue = analogRead(A0);
            lastTime+=intervalBetweenData;
            
            Serial.print(currentTime/1000);
            Serial.print(',');
            Serial.println(sensorValue);
        
          }
          
         
        }

PhotoResistors

A photoresistor