Bernard Schutz (Albert-Einstein Inst., Max-Planck Inst. for Gravitational Physics, Germany):  "Gravitational waves: the real music of the spheres"

Public Talk at Beijing Planetarium, May 8, 2010, 3:30 p.m.

In the coming decade scientists will open the newest window on the universe by detecting for the first time the gravitational waves that were predicted a century before by Einstein. But instead of looking through this window we will be listening to the universe through it, because gravitational waves are space-time's counterpart to sound waves, and our detectors are our microphones. In this multi-media presentation you will be able to listen to the "sounds" made by massive black holes, colliding neutron stars, exploding supernovas, and the Big Bang itself, and you will learn just how different our experience of the universe will be once we have mastered the technology of gravitational wave detection.