He International Pulsar Timing System (IPTA) All week they’ve been waiting for the big announcement for today related to gravitational waves. This morning (Spanish time) they made their first advance with the publication of a Chinese Pulsar Timing Array study in which they point to the discovery of gravitational waves with a frequency nanohertz. They are associated with phenomena between objects so massive that they can even be associated with some of the events that led to the birth of the universe. And now we know that yes, this big announcement was about what is known as stochastic background of gravitational waves or, what is the same, perturbations in space-time caused by the same Big Bang. They announced it at an online event featuring prominent guests such as Jocelyn Belldiscoverer of pulsars and Kip ThorneNobel Prize winner for his role in the discovery of the first gravitational waves.
This conclusion was reached thanks to the joint participation, in addition to Chinaother groups located in USA, Europe, Australia and India. Telescopes located in these parts of the world have served as excellent detectors. Thus, a fluctuation of a very large set of pulsars was discovered, which, with more than one 99% chancewill correspond to gravitational waves corresponding to this stochastic background.
You will need to continue training to increase the percentage. However, already with such a large number, scientists are very optimistic that they have found what they have been working on for years. over 15 years. A phenomenon that could change the history of astronomy as we know it and provide some very interesting information about the early dawn of our universe.
The universe behaves like a big lake
Gravitational waves occur when an explosive phenomenon occurs between very massive objects. break space-time. These phenomena can be, for example, supernova explosions or black hole collisions. Thus, if we visualize space-time as water in a pond, these collisions will be a stone that is thrown inward, forming ripples around itself.
These waves are expected extensionnot until they are removed. That is lower your frequency. For this reason, if one could follow the lower frequency gravitational waves generated by Chorus explosive phenomena throughout the history of the universe, it would be possible get to the big bang. This is what is known as the stochastic background of gravitational waves.
The problem is that, until recently, astronomers didn’t have the tools to detect these low-frequency gravitational waves. But they finally got it. Both from China and from other international groups, gravitational waves with frequencies on the order of nanohertz have been detected. And it let them do it journey back long awaited.
Gravitational Waves from the Big Bang
All detectors of the program known as NANOgrav They work by analyzing changes in pulsating light from a class of stars known as pulsars. A single oscillation can be considered noise caused by another phenomenon. However, if several are detected, the likelihood that this is a background of gravitational waves increases. It is believed that in order to ensure it, the probability of success 5 sigma. In this case, 4 sigma was reached, which is equivalent to the probability 99.349%. So there are reasons to make this statement with such hope.
If this were to be confirmed, these gravitational waves would be generated by all pairs of black holes in the universe. Like a rain of rocks falling into a pond, maybe this one too. the first explosion of the Big Bang.
They even believe that with more research, it will be possible to find out the exact location of these pairs of black holes. Much remains to be explored, but today, even if the expected sigma is not reached, it is a milestone in astronomy.
Source: Hiper Textual
