New rumours that gravitational waves have finally been detected
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A rumour that the world's largest gravitational-wave observatory has caught the first whiff of its quarry is heating up.
Gravitational waves are ripples in space-time produced by massive bodies accelerating through space, such as pairs of neutron stars orbiting each other or the merging of two black holes.
They were predicted as part of Einstein's general relativity a century ago, but have yet to be seen directly. Finding them would confirm the final piece of his theory, and also give us a new way to view the universe, allowing us to probe distant objects that might otherwise be dark or obscured by interstellar dust.
The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) searched for such signals from 2002 to 2010 with no luck. Its more sensitive successor, Advanced LIGO or aLIGO, started collecting data on 18 September.
Fresh sighting
Barely a week later, cosmologist Lawrence Krauss at Arizona State University tweeted a rumour that the detector had already picked up a signal.
Now Krauss claims that the original rumour has been confirmed by an independent source.
"Stay tuned!" he tweeted. "Gravitational waves may have been discovered!! Exciting."
Off Twitter, however, Krauss was more cautious. The signal could have been a false one deliberately injected into the data to test the detection team. "I'm told this isn't that," Krauss told New Scientist. His source says that the LIGO collaboration is writing up a paper on the possible find. "That suggests it's not a false signal – but who knows for sure?"
The official word from the LIGO team is that they are still analysing the data from the first run, which should finish on 12 January. "It takes time to analyse, interpret and review results," says spokesperson Gabriela González at Louisiana State University. "We expect to have news on the run results in the next few months."
"We'll use something other than the rumour mill when we have a contribution to the discussion!" adds David Shoemaker at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28754-new-rumours-that-gravitational-waves-have-finally-been-detected/
Why is this famous physicist tweeting rumors about gravitational waves
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An illustration of how mass in the universe distorts spacetime. (NASA)
The science-y corners of the Internet are positively buzzing with rumors that gravitational waves have been detected. Where is this coming from, and what does it all mean? Here's the deal:
1. The rumor is coming from a credible source, but that doesn't mean it's true.
The first thing you should know about this rumor is that it's from a pretty believable source: Lawrence Krauss is an award-winning physicist and a respected science communicator and advocate. Krauss actually started the rumor back in September, but confirmed it on Monday.
The second thing you should know is that Krauss isn't directly involved in the experiment he's talking about. That's important, and we'll come back to it later.
2. Wait, what are gravitational waves?
Imagine the universe is a stretchy sheet. When you put something heavy on it (like a bowling ball), the sheet will bend to accommodate the object. And when you place smaller objects into this warped piece of sheet, they'll follow curved paths influenced by the bowling ball. Just picture the way a handful of marbles would act on a stretchy sheet held taut, vs. their behavior on one that was sagging with the weight of a bowling ball.
Space ripples and warps are like that, too, and we call these ripples in spacetime gravitational waves.
Gravitational waves could theoretically help us study mysterious objects, such as black holes, but their effects are so tiny that we haven't been able to detect them yet. There's a lot of noise to cut through.
3. Are the rumors true?
Maybe! It's not crazy: Krauss is referring to the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO), a collaboration between physicists at MIT and Caltech. And yes, gravitational waves are really hard to observe – but LIGO did just get an upgrade. In fact, Krauss first tweeted his suspicions just about a week after the observatory had officially reopened. Sometimes rumors turn out to be true – like when months of hype about a Chinese team editing the genes of human embryos ended in an actual announcement.
There's one obvious way this gravitational wave rumor could have been falsely planted. Because gravitational waves are so tiny, and it's easy to get false positives, the LIGO team includes three individuals capable of injecting false signals to test the group's ability to weed them out. This has happened twice before, and, in one instance, the group was ready to publish the data by the time it was revealed as false. Krauss has said on Twitter and elsewhere that his source knows for sure this isn't a blind-injection test, but that seems unlikely unless he has an in with one of those three researchers.
On the other hand, plenty of well-regarded physicists had predicted that 2016 would be the year we finally saw evidence of gravitational waves. It's just that no one hoped we'd be confirming them in the first weeks of the year.
But that's the thing: No one is confirming these rumors anytime soon. The folks at LIGO haven't responded to our request for comment yet, but they've told other outlets that they won't confirm or deny Krauss's tweet. They're working through their data, which may or may not include evidence of gravitational waves, and they'll release it when they're good and ready. Which brings us to our next point:
4. Is it a good idea to blab about this on Twitter?
Many scientists (including those outside the experiment) seem unamused by Krauss's enthusiasm. "We'll use something other than the rumor mill when we have a contribution to the discussion," David Shoemaker of MIT told New Scientist.
Indeed, one usually waits to announce a scientific finding after it's been rigorously peer reviewed. When scientists publish their work, they have to let experts outside their group evaluate the data and the findings. By the time something is published in a scientific journal, it's been vetted (though this still doesn't necessarily mean the findings are accurate). Even Krauss told the Guardian that he was only 60 percent certain the finding was real, since he hadn't seen the data for himself.
In an email to The Post, Krauss explained that he'd only tweeted the rumors after seeing that they'd begun circulating in the physics community through other channels.
"I didn't feel it would jeopardize LIGO, who have no competition and are going to do a careful analysis before saying anything," Krauss wrote. And he said he was surprised that some scientists are peeved about his tweets. "If it turns out to be just a test, then at least the public will have been exposed to the exciting search LIGO is carrying out and why this science is fascinating," he wrote.
But because of Krauss's tweet, the LIGO scientists have lost control of their announcement. Even if they have something that they think is a gravitational wave, they're going to want to be absolutely certain before they even attempt to publish. No one wants to make a claim this monumental and then have it debunked by another scientist – especially because false starts — and this rumor could certainly turn out to be one of those — can confuse the public and make them trust scientists less.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2016/01/12/why-is-this-famous-physicist-tweeting-rumors-about-gravitational-waves/
Scientists may have detected gravity waves for the first time ever
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Physicists have searched for ripples in the fabric of spacetime for nearly 100 years, ever since Albert Einstein's 1915 theory of relativity predicted they exist.
These ripples, called gravitational waves, happen when a massive celestial object suddenly moves, like when a star explodes, or when two massive objects collide, like the merging of two black holes.
These cataclysmic disturbances create ripples through space and time — the same way a rain drop can make ripples when it falls on the surface of a lake.
The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) has been searching for these gravitational waves since 2002 with no luck. But a more powerful, advanced LIGO — about three times more sensitive than the original detector — started operating in September 2015.
And now a rumor is circulating that physicists at the new and improved LIGO have finally detected the elusive waves. If it's true, it will be one of the most important discoveries in physics in the last century.
The rumor first cropped up just a few weeks after the advanced LIGO started operating. Cosmologist Lawrence Krauss tweeted that LIGO may have found the elusive waves at last:
http://uk.businessinsider.com/gravity-waves-detected-rumor-2016-1?r=US&IR=T
Why a rumor about the discovery of something Einstein predicted 100 years ago is going viral
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.LIGO
(Uploaded by Cfoellmi~commonswiki on Wikipedia)
One of the two tunnels that make up LIGO based in Hanford, Washington.
On Monday, theoretical physicist Laurence Krauss sent the scientific community on Twitter reeling when he suggested that researchers may have detected, for the first time, an astrophysical phenomenon called gravitational waves.
Right now, the rumor is just that. The scientists to which the rumor refers work at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and told Business Insider that there is no basis for such a claim, yet.
"We are still taking data, and we won't finish analyzing and reviewing results until at least a month or two later," Gabriela Gonzalez, LIGO spokesperson and Louisiana State University physics and astronomy professor, told Business Insider.
She added: "The instruments are working great, but ... I don't have any news with analysis results to share, yet."
But what if the rumor turns out to be real? Well, the prospect of what that would mean for science is what earned Krauss's Tweet 4,250% more retweets than his usual 40 or so — overnight.
What are gravitational waves and why do they matter?
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.gravity waves
(LLacertae on Flickr)
Artist's concept of gravitational waves in space.
Albert Einstein first predicted the existence of gravitational waves in 1916.
According to his theory of general relativity, a number of incredibly powerful cosmic systems across the universe will generate measurable ripples in the fabric of space-time called gravitational waves.
For example, two black holes orbiting one another. When a smaller black hole meets a larger one, the two attract one another through tremendous gravitational forces.
The smaller black hole will move faster than the larger one, and as it accelerates through space in a gravitational dance with its new partner, it generates gravitational waves.
Over 30 years ago, a pair of scientists using the radio telescope in Puerto Rico made the first indirect detection of gravitational waves by observing the behavior of a distant pulsar binary — a pair of rapidly rotating neutron stars (the densest objects in the universe next to black holes). This indirect detection gave fuel for larger projects, like LIGO and the BICEP2 telescope.
In 2014, the BICEP2 team reported the discovery of gravitational waves, but the discovery was later disproved.
To this day, scientists have yet to confirm the existence of gravitational waves with direct, observational evidence, which is why projects like LIGO are so important.
"The detection of gravitational waves would be a game changer for astronomers in the field," Clifford Will, a distinguished profess of physics at the University of Florida who studied under famed astrophysicist Kip Thorne told Business Insider in 2015. "We would be able to test aspects of general relativity that have not been tested."
Not only that, the ability to observe gravitational waves would open a whole new frontier of astronomy. The same way that astronomers today use light waves to study the universe, they could also use gravitational waves to see cosmic objects — such as colliding black holes — like never before.
How to snag a gravitational wave
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LIGO first began sniffing for gravitational waves in 2002. And between 2002 and 2010, the $620 million experiment came up empty handed.
To better the odds, engineers began upgrading LIGO to make it eventually 10 times more sensitive to gravitational waves.
Last September, scientists turned the new-and-improved machine on and began taking data with, what is now called Advanced LIGO.
The way Advanced LIGO works is that it consists of two identical machines that are located 1,865 miles apart — one is in Livingston, Louisiana and the other is in Hanford, Washington.
At each detector, there are two equally-long tunnels with a mirror at the end (one of the mirrors is shown in the image above). Scientists split a laser beam in two and then fire each half down one of the two tunnels. When the beams reflects off the mirror, the two beams should return at the same time, since they're both traveling at the speed of light.
However, if a gravitational wave passes through the detector the same time the laser is traveling through the two tunnels, scientists expect to see a slight difference in time between when the first and second halves of the beam return.
Compared to the length of light waves we see with our eyes, which are micrometers in size (about the width of a human hair), gravitational waves are huge. This is why the distance between each LIGO detector is over 1800 miles, because that's about how long LIGO scientists think the gravitational waves they're searching for should be.
Therefore, if one detector observes a gravitational wave, it should mean the other detector should measure the same signal, offering immediate confirmation that the observation at the first detector isn't a fluke.
Scientists at LIGO aren't taking any chances with this experiment — they don't want another BICEP2 incident. Before they announce a discovery, the data will have been fully vetted twice-over by their expert peers.
But if they do succeed, it will revolutionize astronomy as we know it.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-rumor-discovery-something-einstein-192436908.html
Rumours fly as physicists hint at the first ever observations of gravitational waves
And that's a huge deal - if it's true.(http://www.sciencealert.com/images/articles/processed/gravitational-waves_1024.jpg)
QuoteEarlier today, well-known American theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss tweeted that the results of a recent experiment looking for gravitational waves have finally been peer-reviewed and we just might have the first direct evidence that these light-speed ripples in the Universe actually exist.
If it turns out that we really do have definitive evidence that gravitational waves exist - the results of the study have not yet been released to the public - we're looking at Nobel Prize-worthy stuff, but the team behind the experiment is urging everybody to be patient and not to jump to conclusions just yet, despite what's going on in your Twitter feed.
http://www.sciencealert.com/rumours-fly-as-physicists-hint-at-the-first-ever-observations-of-gravitational-waves
This would be big news. Keeping an eye on this...
Cosmo
January 12, 2016 | by Stephen Luntz
...The official word remains that LIGO is still analyzing the data and will share news, if they have any, when the proper scientific method for discoveries has been followed. Other scientists are cautioning against building hopes unnecessarily.
Nevertheless, the more confident team members are willing to say, off the record, that not only is the discovery real, but the announcement will come next week.
http://www.iflscience.com/physics/gravitational-wave-rumors-running-hot (http://www.iflscience.com/physics/gravitational-wave-rumors-running-hot)