The gravitational waves were detected on September 14, 2015 at 5:51 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (09:51 UTC) by both of the twin Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) detectors, located in Livingston, Louisiana, and Hanford, Washington, USA.
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A billion years ago, a billion light years away, two black holes collided, sending waves of energy hurtling through space.
Einstein’s general theory of relativity had then predicted the presence of gravitational waves.
Einstein believed that the tiny ripples are caused by every object that moves through time and space.
“Before we started detecting gravitational waves, looking out at the universe was like watching an orchestra without any sound”.
The group at Raman Research Institute in Bengaluru led by Bala R Iyer (currently at ICTS-TIFR), in collaboration with a group of French scientists, pioneered the theoretical calculations used to model gravitational-wave signals from orbiting black holes.
One answer to the query “why is today’s announcement of the discovery of gravitational waves important, and what are the ramifications?” impressed readers beyond all others. Since them, scientists were trying to spot these waves, but they tasted success in finding proof about 60 years after the legend physicist’s death.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the confirmation that gravitational waves exist is the fact they they prove theory right. After detecting the gravitational wave signal, the scientists said that they have converted the same into audio waves and were able to listen to the sounds of two black holes merging.
It took supercomputers to measure it, but what’s even more sublime is that Einstein conceived of this phenomenon 100 years ago and that the waves match his equation.
Researchers at Montana State University are part of a team who’s responsible for a ground breaking scientific discovery.
Reitze said one black hole had the mass of 29 suns; the other was the equivalent of 36 suns. Similar gravitational waves have probably passed through the Earth before, but this time, someone was watching. This is what two black holes colliding would look like.
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“We have a completely new tool to study the universe and answer questions which were not answerable so far”, Stojkovic says.
