The collision of two dead stars has been observed
for the first time by an international team
of researchers, including from Korea.
The discovery opens up a wide range of research
options to help scientists get a better understanding
of our universe.
Ro Aram has the details.
The measurement of the gravitational waves
given off by this cataclysmic event was made
in August by the LIGO-VIRGO Collaboration.
The ripples in space and time were first predicted
by Albert Einstein in his Theory of General
Relativity.
The collision happened 130 million years ago,
but its light and waves have only now reached
us.
Until now, all confirmed detections involved
a deadly dance between two black holes, which
leave no visible signature on the sky.
But this latest event enabled telescopes all
over the world to track down and watch the
cataclysm in multiple wavelengths of light,
allowing astronomers to scrutinize the source
of these cosmic ripples for the first time.
The observations also found that such events
lead to the production of heavy metals, such
as gold and platinum.
But what is even more precious is that the
detection of gravitational waves opens up
the universe to completely new investigations.
(English) Reuters - Edit No. 1059
"Two things it'll help us to do: one is understand
the chemical enrichment of the universe, where
all the diversity in the universe came from,
because it comes from the chemical elements
that we see.
Another thing it will do is, it opens up a
new way of measuring distances in the universe.
We can get a distance measurement to this
source just from the gravitational waves - that's
completely independent of electromagnetic
radiation and the light that we see."
There is still much work to be done, however,
as scientists will have to fine tune equipment
to get a better reading on future discoveries
and research.
Ro Aram, Arirang News.
