Conference on "Colliding Stars and Black Holes" to launch new research institute

The School of Physics and Astronomy will be launching its new Gravity Exploration research institute with a two day conference on “Colliding Stars and Black Holes: Gravity Exploration at Cardiff” on the 29th to the 30th May 2018.

The two day conference will include invited talks by leading astrophysicists from around the world, and will provide a forum for talks and discussions on the future of gravitational-wave astronomy research. The workshop will focus on what we have learnt from multi-messenger observations of gravitational-wave sources, and their implications for the future. There will also be practical sessions on accessing and using gravitational-wave data. The conference will be held at Cardiff University in the Queens Buildings which are in the centre of the city.

Guest speakers include:

• Valerie Connaughton (NASA)
• Hartmut Grote (Cardiff University)
• Andrew Levan (University of Warwick)
• Bernard Schutz (Cardiff University)
• Alberto Vecchio (University Birmingham)

The main topics to be discussed will be:

• Gravitational-wave observations of GW170817
• Electromagnetic observations of GW170817: from gamma rays to radio
• Theoretical Implications: cosmological, astrophysical, fundamental physics
• Future observatories: gravitational waves and EM
• Gravitational wave open data

A special feature associated with the conference will be a public lecture by Nobel Laureate Professor Barry Barish on “LIGO and the Detection of Gravitational Waves”, to be held at the Reardon Smith Lecture Theatre in the National Museum Cardiff at 6.00 pm on the 29th May. Professor Barish will be talking about the search for gravitational waves, their final detection in 2015, and what this means now for future astronomy research.

The public lecture by Professor Barish will be free and open to the public. For more information or to register visit: bit.ly/cardiff-ligo-lecture

This will be followed by a banquet for conference delegates in the main hall of the beautiful National Museum Cardiff, located in the city centre.

We are accepting abstracts now for papers for the conference and you can submit an abstract here: https://cardiff.onlinesurveys.ac.uk/cardiff-gravity-abstract

To register as a delegate for the conference please visit:https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/colliding-stars-and-black-holes-gravity-exploration-in-cardiff-tickets-45521228219?utm_campaign=new_event_email&utm_medium=email&utm_source=eb_email&utm_term=viewmyevent_button