RE: Gravitational waves - from proposals to observations
Great read!
Eratosthenes is actually considered as the father of Geodesy, I talk about him and the process followed for the calculation of the Earth's circumference in this Geodesy post I uploaded 5 months ago. (It's too old, so nobody can accuse me of trying to promote my work here :P).
And here we are now, in 2018 (that is also the beginning of what is coined the gastrophysics era), a world where gravitational waves are a definitely real thing that we can almost touch with our bare hands.
So basically if gravitational waves do exist, then we could possibly invent some sort of device that generates and/or manipulates gravity waves in order to distort the fabric of space-time, making interstellar travel possible?
Fascinating times! I'm very excited about the future!
Gravitational waves exist. This has been proved last year. Any accelerating mass generates gravitational waves. However, one needs something very very heavy to get waves that are observables. In other words, black holes or neutron stars.
Since we are not even far to only imagining producing a neutron star or a black hole, the answer to your question is 'no way' (at least for now) :D
Theoretically proven based on Einstine's relativity study but scientifically not for there is no existing particle that can travel the same speed as the light even if it is increasingly accelerating. Well, not unless if it is a blackhole. :)
It is more than just theoretical. I must disagree and confirm that black holes have somehow been experimentally observed.
The only way to generate the wave we observed comes from the collision of two black holes (or neutron stars). We have no other astrophysical object in our catalogue capable to be responsible for such observations. Of course, the observation could be due to something we don't know, but which mimics a black hole very very well (then let's call it a black hole in the meantime).
Concerning the speed of light, the neutron star events proved that gravitational waves travel at the speed of light, like photons and gluons by the way.
What about photons? They are zero mass particles that travel at the speed of light.
It represents a light so basically, it has similar features same as light and not more than the light can travel at 3x10^8 m/s. And also, particle must have mass enough to produce a certain amount of attracting force as it travels way beyond the speed of light. An object increases its mass as it travels a huge amount of speed say for example greater than light. Thus if it increases its mass then the force of attraction between anybody and that certain body increases.
The flaw here is that gravity does not involve only mass but also energy. In this way, photons are sensitive to gravity as well.
I guess I answered everywhere by now :)
Thanks for taking the time to clarify things!
It is always a pleasure! :)
I've no idea if it will become manipulable, but the results have a lot of other applications, such as being able to see how black holes form, seeing things before they emit light, seeing into supernovae, and general transformation of our understanding of the Universe. Hopefully.
I answered ^^