Show Notes
All around us in the universe, black holes are smashing into each other with tremendous force. These events are so powerful that they cause ripples in the fabric of space-time—and these ripples, called gravitational waves, travel hundreds of millions of light-years across the universe, eventually passing through the Earth.
Prof. Daniel Holz and fellow scientists at LIGO knew that detecting these waves would take us closer to figuring out many profound mysteries, including the size, age and composition of the universe. They built the most sensitive machine ever constructed, detected the waves and opened up an entirely new window on the universe.
In this time-and-space-bending episode of Big Brains, the UChicago cosmologist talks black holes, testing Einstein’s predictions, and the threat of nuclear annihilation.
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Transcript
PAUL RAND: Since the beginning of time, humans have been trying to understand our…
