# @science on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/DNZmfGPNMnB
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/33640910-science-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/43ff3e75ae.jpg
- **Posted:** 2025-08-16T03:00:22.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** Science 🧬 (@science) — https://gondola.cc/science

## Caption

Everybody seems to be looking for a little peace these days. But even such a reasonable idea can go too far. The quietest place on earth, an anechoic chamber at Orfield Laboratories in Minnesota, is so quiet that the longest anybody has been able to bear it is 45 minutes.⁠
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Inside the room, it's silent. So silent that the background noise measured is negative decibels, -9.4 dB. Steven Orfield, and in 2013, the lab's founder, told Hearing Aid Know: “We challenge people to sit in the chamber in the dark – one person stayed in there for 45 minutes. When it’s quiet, ears will adapt. The quieter the room, the more things you hear. You’ll hear your heart beating, sometimes you can hear your lungs, and hear your stomach gurgling loudly. In the anechoic chamber, you become the sound."⁠
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But the room isn't just for torturing people. Companies test their products in it to find out just how loud they are. And NASA has sent astronauts to help them adapt to the silence of space. For some, however, the room is a deeply disorienting place. Not only do people hear their heartbeat, but they also have trouble orienting themselves and even standing. "How you orient yourself is through the sounds you hear when you walk. In the anechoic chamber, you don't have any cues," Orfield told the Daily Mail. "You take away the perceptual cues that allow you to balance and maneuver. If you're in there for half an hour, you have to be in a chair."⁠
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#orfieldlabs #chamber #wow #science

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## Tags

orfieldlabs, wow, science, chamber

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