Scientists at two research institutes in Bengaluru made fundamental contributions to the historical discovery of gravitational waves.

Delivering a talk on ‘LIGO Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger’, Parameswaran Ajith, an astrophysicist at the International Centre for Theoretical Sciences (ICTS), said: “Foundational work has been done by Raman Research Institute (RRI), Bengaluru, and Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune.”
For example, the team involved in LIGO study at RRI pioneered developing expected models of wave forms and computing expected models of wave forms using a technique called the Post Newtonian Approximation.

“Direct contribution of the ICTS is in terms of observation. Our team contributed by inferring the mass and spin of the final black hole,” he said. There have been several tests to check the consistency of data with Einstein’s theory, one of the test was developed and implemented at the ICTS while another test was developed at the RRI.

The Chennai Mathematical Institute and the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Thiruvananthapuram, were other institutes which contributed to the project.
Ajith also said that while the discovery was made back in September 2015, the data verified over four months and finally the discovery made public in February. He said “more announcements” would be on the way as more data was to be verified.