What are gravitational waves according to scientists. They saw the gravitational waves for the first time. They saw the appearance of gravity from the light that comes from the same cosmic event.
The cosmic event that occurred was a collision between two neutron stars. Both are celestial bodies that can emit light.
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The collision between these two neutron stars is indeed a common event that can occur in outer space. In fact, since millions of years ago there has been this collision event.
What Are Gravitational Waves in the Universe
Gravity is a close thing to life. When studying gravity, the main example is on Earth.
In Einstein’s theory, gravity can be created because of objects with mass that cause space and time to bend.
Thus, gravity according to Einstein is a consequence of the curvature of space and time. The theory of gravity even consists of several versions.
Understanding Gravitational Waves
Before knowing the meaning of this material, you need to know exactly what gravity really is.
Launching from Wikipedia, gravity is a natural phenomenon that makes all things with mass or energy, including planets, stars, galaxies, and even light attract each other.
To understand what gravitational waves are, it is necessary to go back to 1916 when Einstein said the universe is a four-dimensional fabric with space-time.
Einstein explained that there are gravitational waves in the space-time of the universe. The scientist with the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics also revealed that these waves are wrinkles in a four-dimensional fabric.
According to him, wrinkles or waves can originate from any object in the universe that changes speed and direction.
So, in a simple sense gravitational waves are disturbances or ripples that exist in the universe. We can think of the shape of gravitational waves like wrinkles in cloth.
Wave Discovery
Scientists have discovered the appearance of these waves for the first time along with light originating from the same cosmic event.
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The discovery of what gravitational waves are was revealed to the press in Washington DC, United States in 2017.
Scientists from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and Virgo conducted the press.
This press is very important because the discovery of these waves is a new history and a major achievement in the field of science, especially physics and economics.
In fact, it was so important that the three founders and researchers at LIGO at the time won the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics. All three played an important role in the first detection of waves in the universe in 2017.
How to Detect Gravity Waves?
Of course, these waves are not easily detected by the human eye. In principle, gravitational waves passing through an object will make the object slightly change shape.
Objects hit by waves will expand and also compress according to the direction of the gravitational waves.
With these properties, the resulting waves can be easily detected by LIGO, a facility consisting of tens of kilometers of vacuum pipes and laser firing instruments.
In this LIGO facility there is a detector that is sensitive and of course very selective. The detector aims to detect only gravitational waves, not other types.
The presence of LIGO is very useful and allows us to understand what true gravitational waves are.
Until now there are at least four gravity detection systems, namely LIGO Italy, LIGO USA, GEO600 Germany, and TAMA300 Japan.
Why Should Detect Waves gravity?
The detection of this first wave unknowingly brings many benefits and opens a new era in the world of astronomy and astrophysics.
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When waves are successfully detected, we can learn more deeply about various events that have occurred in the universe.
For example, the gravitational waves detected in 2015 were formed by the collision of two black holes. Research on cosmic waves can help us understand what has happened in the universe.
Knowing what gravitational waves are may sound trivial, but they are very important. The existence of waves has been a mystery for a long time, until finally humans now have sophisticated tools to detect them. (R10/HR-Online)
This post was last modified on April 2, 2023 6:29 AM
