What are gravitational waves?

Tianqin, China’s domestic gravitational wave research project initiated by the Sun Yat-sen University in July 2015, is awaiting governmental approval, Xinhua news agency reported. These cosmic ripples speed up in frequency and rises in amplitude as the black holes merge, then quickly die down once the union is complete, creating a kind of cosmic chirp. Scientists said that it corresponded well with Einstein’s theory and that there was no ambiguity in their discovery.

The gravitational waves detected are from the collision of two black holes 1.3 billion years ago. That means the Sun and Earth emit gravitational waves too.

Last September, two of the most sensitive scientific instruments ever made detected those waves as they swept past Earth, causing a tiny distortion in the fabric of space-time. And anyone who assumes that gravitational waves will never be harnessed for any useful objective risks joining those who called the transistor a toy.

Because the gravitational waves are so small, the researchers had to use the LIGO, which is actually “a system of two identical detectors” located in Livingston, Louisiana, and the other in Hanford, Washington.

“Colliding black holes and gravitational waves are our first handsome examples”. Scientists already knew the kind of sound that gravitational waves emanating from such events were likely to produce.

“Einstein would be beaming”, said National Science Foundation director France Cordova. And it is a ringing (pun intended) confirmation of the nature of black holes, the bottomless gravitational pits from which not even light can escape, which were the most foreboding (and unwelcome) part of his theory.

The Theory of General Relativity states that giant objects such as black holes, stars and planets could distort the space-time, just like how gravity works when a ball rolls down towards a person standing on a trampoline.

This discovery marks the first time gravitational waves have been directly observed, validating one of Albert Einstein’s predictions made 100 years ago. The black holes were 29 and 36 times larger than the mass of the sum and they gave off gravitational waves as they spiraled into one another.