LIGO: Gravitational Wave Announcement

[Anonymous]

LIGO gravitational wave detector is about to make a big announcement at 10.30 EST on 11 Feb. The event will be livestreamed via Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyo4DFr4D4I

I can't predict the future but it sounds likely they will announce confirmation of the direct detection of a gravitational wave. If they did do this, it would strongly reinforce general relativity (not that it needs it...), likely confirm that gravity propagates at light speed, and will provide reinforcement for dark matter theories by both strengthening GR and placing yet more constraints on the various fringe theories that reject dark matter.

Update: Detection confirmed.

 

[wbnc]

n interesting little session. basically we saw gravitational waves that matched predicted models almost exactly..

Her is how we made the measurements..here is how we screened the data..this is what it means....and some Russian guy stands up and Says.."isn't this all based on something a Russian idea..."...i'm not kidding about the Russian reporter....

 

[Reynard]

Must be a distant ancestor to Pavel Chekov. "Of course keptin, we inwented it!".

 

[AndrewW]

For anyone that might be interested in helping out in the detection there is: (not part of this discovery)

https://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/

 

[Anonymous]

For anyone that might be interested in helping out in the detection there is: (not part of this discovery)

https://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/

Off the wall marketing suggestion: Turn this into a cryptocurrency (bitcoin) ... one 'eincoin' per star discovered or something.

 

[wbnc]

Must be a distant ancestor to Pavel Chekov. "Of course keptin, we inwented it!".

My thoughts exactly. However he did manage to point out that the technology,research,and theory behind this discovery has been decades in the making. Form the sound of it the process has included every major country on the planet and thousands of people. II'm not sure which amazes me more the discovery..which had long been predicted..or the amount of cooperation in the project.

What really surprised me was the degree of accuracy they had in earlier mathematics models of what they expected to find...to the point once they recognized the signal they could identify a general area of space, distance and cause of the wave. and since it's been peer reviewed and tested I am assuming the data, and results are solid....I hope they have a suit to wear when they accept the Nobel for this one.