'Ringing' Black Hole Validates Einstein's General Relativity Ahead Of Schedule

[TexasTowelie]

An illustration of a supersized black hole resulting from the merger of two smaller black holes. The collision has caused the black hole to ring and radiate gravitational waves (white). [Graphic credit: Maximiliano Isi/MIT]


Astrophysicists have heard a black hole ringing like a bell, for the first time, according to Will Farr associate professor at Stony Brook University in New York and group leader for gravitational wave astronomy at the Flatiron Institute‘s Center for Computational Astrophysics in New York City.

Farr and his colleagues presented their findings September 12 in Physical Review Letters.

By reanalyzing the first black hole merger ever detected, the astrophysicists measured the gravitational wave ‘tones’ emitted following the event. The breakthrough comes 10 years earlier than expected and confirms that the properties of black holes are just as Einstein predicted in his theory of general relativity in 1915.

“Previously it was believed these tones were too faint to be detected, yet now we are able to,” says study co-author Farr. “Just like the measurement of atomic spectra in the late 1800s opened the era of stellar astrophysics and classifying and understanding stars, this is the opening of the era of black hole spectra and understanding black holes and the general relativity that sits behind them.”

Read more: https://arizonadailyindependent.com/2019/09/14/ringing-black-hole-validates-einsteins-general-relativity-ahead-of-schedule/