[OKC-CosmologyGravity] Extra Thursday colloquium

[Edvard Mörtsell]

Hi all,

Spephan Rosswog asked me to alert you all that there will be an extra 
colloquium Thursday at 14:00 that should be of special interest to us:

Radio astronomy and the centenary of general relativity
           AlbaNova and Nordita Colloquium

     Speaker :     Michael Kramer (Max-Planck Institute for Radio 
Astronomy, Bonn)

     Abstract :     This year, we celebrate the centenary of Einstein’s 
theory of general relativity. When the theory was conceived, the number 
of experimental tests to confront the theory with was limited. Since 
then we have come a long way. In particular astronomical observations 
provide precision tests that were inconceivable even 50 years ago. We 
use neutron stars observable as pulsars to provide the most precise 
tests for strongly self-gravitating bodies, to prove that gravitational 
waves exist or to measure the effects of curvature of space time. We 
also attempt to determine the properties of black holes, such as their 
mass and spin to test the description of black holes within general 
relativity. One of the highlights will be an image of the “shadow" of 
the supermassive black hole in the centre of our Milky Way. Soon we also 
expect that the direct detection of gravitational waves opens up a new 
window to Einstein’s Universe. In all cases, neutron stars or black 
holes play a crucial role. In this talk I will review some of the 
current and future tests of general relativity, but will also mention 
alternative theories of gravity and other applications of radio 
astronomy for fundamental physics, such as studying the 
equation-of-state of super-dense matter.


Best / Edvard

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Edvard Mortsell
Stockholm University
Department of Physics
SE-106 91 Stockholm
Sweden
Tel: +46-8-55378535
Web: http://www.fysik.su.se/~edvard/
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