... So in other words it DOESN'T involve liquid nitrogen...

Bummer... Those experiments are always COOL. (aha... AHAHAHA! I think I'm witty @w@)

i always wondered if there was a word for that effect!

i wonder if people will implement the acoustic version in actual music and how well theyll actually pull it off

That sounds absolutely fascinating. What journal is the article from?

Science always makes me excited for the future. This is no exception.

This could be annoying at concerts.

Tekulo: ...

Aho-Chan: No idea. If you could make the back wall of the concert hall like this, the effect would happen, but I don't know if that would be desired...

V1P2: The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America.

Delicious Chocolate Milk: Hear, hear!

Lego Obsessionist. Depends on what the desired outcome of the music is. But, yes. XD

Also, my current research advisor told me that he knew of a place at his graduate institution where there was a cemetery with an iron fence. The fence had posts equally spaced apart. If you clapped (which, being a sonic impulse, has a wide frequency spectrum) you would get a "chirp" sound back at a frequency that was determined by where you were standing relative to the fence; very similar to the effect I explained above.

Again, awesome.

XD Sorry bro, you know how I get when I'm commenting AND sleep deprived.

Still, it sounds interesting... But, I'm not too sure what something like this could be applied to.

I now have a sudden urge for bubbles... be right back...

The article mentioned that, while optical iridescence is beautiful and pleasing to the eye, the acoustical analog is not so aurally pleasant.

There is a simulation of what this would sound like as you changed angle with respect to the surface reflecting noise on his blog, but seeing as it enables commenting, I probably shouldn't post it here.