The confirmation that the whole world was waiting for has arrived: gravitational waves really exist and scientists have managed to observe them. So Albert Einstein was right.
The announcement came today at 16.30 (Italian time) at the same time as the United States. "It is the first direct detection of gravitational waves" and "opens a new chapter in astronomy", said the coordinator of the Virgo scientific collaboration, Fulvio Ricci, presenting the data.
The LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) instrument detected the gravitational waves, thanks to which the scientists were able to observe the ripples in the fabric of space-time produced by two colliding black holes.
The analysis of the results was carried out in collaboration between Ligo and Virgo. The latter is part of the European Gravitational Observatory (EGO) founded and financed by the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (Infn) and the French National Research Council (Cnrs).
Gravitational waves are the ripples in space-time generated by violent cosmic events. As an example, we can imagine the waves produced when a stone is thrown into a pond. Albert Einstein had hypothesized about a century ago and almost a hundred years later, scientists have managed to prove it.
