LIGO and Virgo collaborations

Upgrades to gravity wave detectors promise more discoveries

3 April 2019 Astronomy Now

After major upgrades to improve sensitivity, the LIGO and Virgo gravitational wave observatories are set to begin a year of joint observations.

Cataclysmic neutron star merger generates powerful jet

27 February 2019 Astronomy Now

Astronomers studying the aftermath of the merger of two neutron stars have found what appears to be a powerful jet blasting through a shell of debris.

LIGO and VIRGO announce four new gravitational-wave detections

3 December 2018 Astronomy Now

The LIGO and VIRGO collaboration has announced the detection of gravitational waves from four previously unseen black hole mergers, including one that happened nine billion years ago

Gravity waves marked birth of merged hypermassive neutron star

14 November 2018 Astronomy Now

Detailed analysis of gravitational wave data collected last year indicating the merger of two neutron stars shows the result was a single massive neutron star, not a black hole.

Gravitational waves from a binary black hole merger observed by LIGO and Virgo

27 September 2017 Astronomy Now

The LIGO Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo collaboration report the first joint detection of gravitational waves with both the LIGO and Virgo detectors. This is the fourth announced detection of a binary black hole system and the first significant gravitational-wave signal recorded by the Virgo detector, and highlights the scientific potential of a three-detector network of gravitational-wave detectors.

Seeds of supermassive black holes could be revealed by gravitational waves

27 June 2016 Astronomy Now

Gravitational waves captured by space-based detectors could help identify the origins of supermassive black holes, according to new computer simulations. Durham University’s Institute for Computational Cosmology ran the huge cosmological simulations that can be used to predict the rate at which gravitational waves caused by collisions between the monster black holes might be detected.