Val Zavala>> Now this is going to sound a little weird, but he believed that aliens told him to build a dome, a dome that would extend his life. Did it work? Well, we find out from student reporter, Heather Downie. She's part of USC's Annenberg School of Journalism and she headed to the desert to visit something called the Integratron.
Heather Downie>> In the middle of the desert in Landers, California, an other-worldly sight filled with other-worldly sounds.
Nancy Karl>> They've called it a temple. They've called it a church. They've called it a vortex.
Heather Downie>> Thousands visit the Integratron every year. Constructed with no nails or screws, it's the only all-wood, acoustically perfect dome in the United States. It was designed by George Van Tassel, an aeronautical engineer and UFO enthusiast. In 1953, Van Tassel said he was contacted by aliens from Venus.
Nancy Karl>> He said that he had a physical encounter with a space ship and that these beings told him that he could build a machine that would extend our lives twenty to fifty years or more.
Heather Downie>> For the next twenty-five years, Van Tassel held annual UFO conventions to fund the construction of the Integratron, a structure for channeling electromagnet energy into the body, but he died before his high-voltage healing machine was complete. And while his intentions died with him, the Integratron took on a whole new life in 2000. That's when the Karl sisters, Joanne and Nancy, purchased and transformed the dome into a sound chamber.
Even though the origins of this dome may seem a little bit out there, the acoustical benefits are actually grounded in real science. There's evidence that certain frequencies of audio can actually be good for you. These good vibrations are produced by thirty-minute crystal bowl symphonies, or sound backs, and are supposed to rejuvenate the body and mind.
Nancy Karl>> That it bathes the nervous system and relaxes muscles and energizes the brain.
Heather Downie>> Each crystal bowl emits a certain frequency, or note. Each note is supposed to heal a specific part of the body.
Nancy Karl>> G at the throat, A at the middle of the forehead and B for the brain.
Carl Ripaldi>> You hear them, but you also feel them. You feel them going through your body sort of pulsating. Each of the sounds has a different kind of a feel and pulsation to it and you kind of lose sense of time while it's being done.
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Trina Nader>> It just sort of puts you into yourself. It's what some people might call spiritual.
Heather Downie>> Spirituality aside, many architects come here to admire its design.
Nancy Karl>> It's parabolic, right? The same shape as a satellite dish. When something is parabolic, anything that comes into it is focused and amplified. Some people call it sacred geometry. It's the same kind of math behind the architecture of cathedrals and mosques and Masonic temples and things like that.
Heather Downie>> Some people claim the Integratron is even more sacred because it sits on top of a vortex, a spot where the earth's energy is said to be most powerful.
Nancy Karl>> The building was put right here at an intersection of geomagnetic activity and then this parabolic structure focuses and amplifies that and creates this huge energy surge that really is magic. It's kind of like magic to people. You know, people go to the pyramids for spiritual quests, but they also go there because it's a wonder of the world. You know, I see this as kind of that, like a wonder of the world.
Heather Downie>> A wonder in our own back yard. For Life and Times, I'm Heather Downie.
Val Zavala>> Our thanks again to student journalist, Heather Downie, for that story. And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. We'll see you next time.
