Long ago, two black holes collided in a distant galaxy.
The reason we know this is because, over a billion years later, on the morning of September 14, 2015, we felt: in space, the laser moved a little bit like a ripple --
Time washes over the Earth.
The first detection of gravitational waves is the culmination of an epic scientific exploration and an astonishing recognition of Einstein's landmark theory of gravity, general relativity.
Since then, we have seen our detectors five more times.
But it's just the beginning-and while everything we 've learned from the first wave is in line with Einstein's masterpiece, there's a lot of sightings coming up that could tear it apart.
Gravitational waves take us to the unknown waters where the structure of the universe is so distorted and gravity is so extreme that our best theory is pushed to the limit.
"If there is a problem with general relativity, we will find it here," says Salvatore Vitale of MIT . ".
When engineers recalibrate the lasers to make the detectors more sensitive, physicists are looking forward to what they might reveal.
Theorists are now studying cosmic anomalies that can change our understanding of black holes, gravity, and space. time itself.
It is difficult to find their abnormal signals;
In some cases, we hardly know what we are looking.
But a group of physicists claim that we have discovered them.