It has been flooded with rumors today Internet about the possible discovery gravitational waves for the first time, by an American team of astrophysicists.
The rumors were sparked by the announcement by the Harvard University Astronomy Center that next Tuesday at 18:00 p.m. Greeces will announce in a press conference a scientific discovery of the greatest importance, without however giving more information.
From that point on, on social media and in the newsgraphics agencies, there was much speculation as to what the discovery might be, with the most imaginative talking about the detection of life in space, but the opinion quickly prevailed that the news would be related to the discovery of gravitational waves, an idea that stems from the Albert Einstein's equations describing space and time.
According to the theory of Relativity, nothing is transmitted faster than the light, and this even applies to forces, such as gravity. Einstein's theory describes gravity through the curvature of space-time caused by mass and energy, and according to it, it is transmitted by gravitational waves, which are essentially wrinkles in the structure of space-time.
Because gravity is a very weak force, the detection of these waves has proven to be a very difficult task, and it is certainly impossible with technical means on Earth.
It has been suggested, however, in the past, that gravitational wave detection could be achieved by studying polarization in background radiation, in the wake of the Great Explosion created by the Universe before 13.8 billions of years.
According to inflationary theory, the prevailing view of the evolution of the Universe, the Big Bang was followed by a brief period in which the Universe grew exponentially in size. From the main ones forecasts of the said theory, is the imprinting of the gravitational waves in the background radiation spectrum, which in the first moments of the Universe were much stronger due to the high energies that prevailed.
Given that Harvard's astronomy center houses the BICEP2 experiment, which is dedicated to studying polarization of background radiation, it is very likely that astrophysicists have identified the gravitational imprint of the early Universe.
If this information is confirmed, it will be one of the most important discoveries of the last century that will surely make sense. Next update will follow on Monday.