Queen's University Belfast this week opened a £4.5 million sonic-arts research centre. The facility, with a 50-member research team of internationally recognised experts in music, electronic engineering and computer science, is the only one of its kind in the UK or Ireland. Michael Alcorn, director of the centre, said: "Sonic art, including computer music, electronic music and electroacoustic music, has been the most significant development in western music in the past 50 years."