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[KSweeley]

Just reported that the trio who are members of a collaboration that discovered gravitational waves have won the Nobel Prize in physics, Nobel Prizes in chemistry to be announced tomorrow, Wednesday, October 4, in literature on Thursday, October 5, in peace on Friday, October 6 and in economics on Monday, October 9: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...0&wpisrc=al_alert-COMBO-hse%2Bnational&wpmk=1

Rainer Weiss, Barry C. Barish and Kip S. Thorne have won the 2017 Nobel Prize in physics. The three are members of the LIGO-Virgo detector collaboration that discovered gravitational waves. The prize was awarded "for decisive contributions to the LIGO detector and the observation of gravitational waves," the committee said in a news release.

”This year's prize is about a discovery that shook the world," said the Nobel committee representative during a conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.

The Nobel committee has awarded a prize in physics 111 times since 1901. Last year, three researchers won for their work in the field of topology. Topology, as The Washington Post reported, is the study of state changes more intricate than the pivot from liquid to solid. The 2016 laureates discovered exotic transformations that turn matter into superconductors or frictionless liquids, able to swirl in a never-slowing vortex.

Winners of the Nobel Prize in physics join a rarefied group that counts Albert Einstein, Marie Curie and Niels Bohr as members. More recent laureates include University of Manchester scientists Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, who won the 2010 prize. They performed groundbreaking experiments with graphene, a lattice of carbon a single atom thick. In 2013, François Englert and Peter Higgs won for predicting a subatomic particle called the Higgs boson, the existence of which was confirmed by the Large Hadron Collider in 2012.

A team of more than a thousand scientists, researchers and technicians, making up the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, discovered the first gravitational ripple in space-time in September 2015. Detectors have sensed three other gravitational waves since then, all from merging black holes. The LIGO team, plus the Italian Virgo detector, announced the most recent cosmic distortion discovery in September.

The Nobel Prize in chemistry will be announced on Wednesday, the literature prize on Thursday and the peace prize on Friday. An award in economics, not one of the original prizes but now conducted in memory of Alfred Nobel, will be announced Monday.

 

[theignoramus]

I read Kip Thornes book about black holes back in high school. Nice to see him recognised for excellence.

 

[LiveFromKyoto]

“This year’s prize is about a discovery that shook the world," said the Nobel committee representative during a conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.


Shook the world? I didn't even hear about this. I think it got buried under the news about that time Trump tweeted that thing.

 

[sazzy]

“This year’s prize is about a discovery that shook the world," said the Nobel committee representative during a conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.


Shook the world? I didn't even hear about this. I think it got buried under the news about that time Trump tweeted that thing.

.... its a play on the word 'shook'

 

[7he Talon]

Kip Throne is the Interstellar guy, right?

 

[cameron]

“This year’s prize is about a discovery that shook the world," said the Nobel committee representative during a conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.


Shook the world? I didn't even hear about this. I think it got buried under the news about that time Trump tweeted that thing.

First observation was in Sept 2015. Press release for the public was in Feb 2016. The discovery was huge news, reported everywhere.

https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/news/ligo20160211

 

[faridmon]

So in laymans terms, what is Gravitational Wave and what effect does it have on Universe on Large? on Earth?

 

[Doikor]

So in laymans terms, what is Gravitational Wave and what effect does it have on Universe on Large? on Earth?

Here is a video trying to explain it in a way normal people can understand it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GbWfNHtHRg

 

[CoolOff]

“This year’s prize is about a discovery that shook the world," said the Nobel committee representative during a conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.


Shook the world? I didn't even hear about this. I think it got buried under the news about that time Trump tweeted that thing.

I think that's more on you than anything else.

 

[Rentahamster]

Kip Throne is the Interstellar guy, right?

Yep. He's cool.

 

[Orbis Tabula]

Shit. I've been robbed again. Dammit, back to garage.

 

[LewieP]

Kip Throne is the Interstellar guy, right?

and Contact.

 

[~ Zyzomys ~]

Here is a video trying to explain it in a way normal people can understand it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GbWfNHtHRg

Thank you for that link.

 

[Moosichu]

A good video on Gravitational Waves:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iphcyNWFD10

 

[Brat-Sampson]

Very well deserved. Proof and evidence from a hunt that started decades ago and opens new frontiers for astrophysics research.

 

[Oersted]

Was a no-brainer that they would get it sooner or later

 

[Xe4]

Pretty much unsurprising. I would've been more shocked if those three didn't win this year, honestly.

Congratulations to the winners, obviously. They did some crazy good work and opened up a new field of astrophysics, which is amazing. Definitely not something I thought I'd see in my lifetime, but I'm glad I did.

 

[self_aware_keyboard]

I may be in vast minority here.

Can someone explain why the detection of the Grav. waves merits the Nobel. Surely it was just an engineering challenge to make a detector capable of sensing them? I don't think anyone doubted that they exist.

Anytime I read anything about micro processor makers, I am amazing at the tricks they can pull to fit more stuff on the chip. Compared to measuring the length of two perpendicular lengths , I dunno im not that bowled over.

 

[vordhosbn]

How come Nobel prizes in physics back in the day were almost always won by a single person but in modern times by multiple people?

 

[self_aware_keyboard]

How come Nobel prizes in physics back in the day were almost always won by a single person but in modern times by multiple people?

Big new idea stuff- very very hard, very rare

"easier" to do something, and that usually means equipment, which means money, which means grant applications which nearly always are made up of groups. Also in physics, they usually like to have independent groups to verify the others results. Basically loads of people.

 

[Stinkles]

So in laymans terms, what is Gravitational Wave and what effect does it have on Universe on Large? on Earth?

Evidence of mass warping spacetime like ripples on a pond that can be measured and pinpointed and used to detect objects that create them including black holes and potentially dark matter.

 

[RoadHazard]

“This year’s prize is about a discovery that shook the world," said the Nobel committee representative during a conference in Stockholm on Tuesday.


Shook the world? I didn't even hear about this. I think it got buried under the news about that time Trump tweeted that thing.

Everyone with any interest in science heard about it, it was big news. Some people unfortunately remain completely uninterested, which is not just sad but also bad for the world (maybe not so much this specific topic, but low scientific literacy in general).

 

[Linkyn]

So in laymans terms, what is Gravitational Wave and what effect does it have on Universe on Large? on Earth?

The basic idea is that when any mass has acceleration, it distorts spacetime around it. This distortion travels outward at (assumed) the speed of light in vacuum. The essential effect of the distortion is to alternately stretch and compress spacetime, which means that the distance between objects along that direction will change, not because they actually moved closer together or further apart, but rather because the 'length' of space between them has changed (try picturing dots on a balloon that is repeatedly inflated and deflated).

What is so cool about this is that it highlights a fundamental symmetry in the universe. Accelerating masses creating gravitational waves mirrors the way that accelerating charges create electromagnetic waves (eg infrared, visible light, UV, etc).

The problem with this process is that, among the four fundamental forces of nature (gravity, electromagnetism, strong nuclear, weak nuclear), gravity is the weakest by a downright ridiculous amount. This means that you need very large masses to be able to detect these waves in the first place, and even then, you need to be incredibly careful because any of the other forces can easily mask them.

 

[AHK_Hero]

A good video on Gravitational Waves:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iphcyNWFD10

Fascinating video.

 

[All Possible Ways]

Just as expected . This is very well deserved.

I may be in vast minority here.

Can someone explain why the detection of the Grav. waves merits the Nobel. Surely it was just an engineering challenge to make a detector capable of sensing them? I don't think anyone doubted that they exist.

Anytime I read anything about micro processor makers, I am amazing at the tricks they can pull to fit more stuff on the chip. Compared to measuring the length of two perpendicular lengths , I dunno im not that bowled over.

The length shift they measure at LIGO is less than one part in a thousand of the diameter of a proton, and that is in the position of a mirror, which is a macroscopic object. This is at least nine orders of magnitude more precision than what is needed for transistors. For one thing, even quantum uncertainty from the laser beam's photons is an important source of noise.

 

[Stinkles]

I may be in vast minority here.

Can someone explain why the detection of the Grav. waves merits the Nobel. Surely it was just an engineering challenge to make a detector capable of sensing them? I don't think anyone doubted that they exist.

Anytime I read anything about micro processor makers, I am amazing at the tricks they can pull to fit more stuff on the chip. Compared to measuring the length of two perpendicular lengths , I dunno im not that bowled over.

In theory it will allow us to image parts of the universe that are otherwise completely invisible. The technique may be able to act as a visualizer in the way that radio astronomy does - allowing us to detect, measure and illustrate what some of these objects actually look like.

You may find for example that a Galaxy with its dark matter presented in false color, is dramatically different than the idea of a spiral you probably have in your head.

It's as big a discovery as radio astronomy and possibly more important in the future.

 

[Fenderputty]

In theory it will allow us to image parts of the universe that are otherwise completely invisible. The technique may be able to act as a visualizer in the way that radio astronomy does - allowing us to detect, measure and illustrate what some of these objects actually look like.

You may find for example that a Galaxy with its dark matter presented in false color, is dramatically different than the idea of a spiral you probably have in your head.

It's as big a discovery as radio astronomy and possibly more important in the future.

LA Times did something on this a short while ago. With larger detectors planned we will eventually be able to closely monitor black holes and such. New designs should allow us to track waves further back, much closer to the point of the big bang. If multiverses are true we could detect collisions if one ever did hit our universe. It's pretty cool shit.