March 24, 2014, by Emma Thorne

The next big deal: detecting gravitational waves at your desk

Researchers at The University of Nottingham are developing desktop technology to detect the ripples in space-time that would have been created when the universe was in its infancy.

Einstein’s theory of General Relativity predicts that gravitational waves would have been formed in the short time after the Big Bang, when the universe grew from the size of an atom to the size of a tennis ball – waves which could still be detected today. The real challenge for scientists now is how to directly identify these waves.

Dr Carlos Sabin from the School of Mathematical Sciences is among those researchers working on a new system to hunt these gravity ripples. Read what he has to say about their work in The Conversation.

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