The last century has witnessed a tremendous progress thanks to the observation of the electromagnetic radiation. Gravitational waves have opened a new window to space and revolutionised our understanding of the universe. They were for the first time detected by the LIGO detectors in September 2015. The waves came to Planet Earth as a result of a catastrophic event in the distant universe, which confirmed a prediction of Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity. This talk will look at gravitational waves, the first discovery of the Advanced LIGO and the humans' role for the discovery.
Alicia Sintes Olives is the lead researcher of the scientific collaboration LIGO at the University of the Balearic Islands and has been a board member of LIGO-LSC since 2002 and the GEO executive committee. Sintes is a Full Professor of the University in the area of Theoretical Physics. She has been a Marie Curie fellow, a senior researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics in Germany, as well as on research projects in Portugal, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy. Her research focuses on the field of gravitational wave astronomy. Sintes is an expert in the "commissioning" of detectors, and in the study and search for neutron stars and binary systems of black holes. She has led different research projects within the LIGO and GEO collaborations. Sintes has participated in the development of the software "LIGO Scientific Collaboration Algorithm Library Suite" and has contributed to the computing project Einstein @ home. Since March 2016 she is co-chair of the LIGO-Virgo Continuous waves working group and a member of LIGO's Data Analysis Council, as well as internal referee for LIGO's "continuous waves" and "compact binaries data analysis" working groups.
This event is organised in partnership with Instituto Cervantes Sofia.
