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IndIGO, the Indian Initiative in Gravitational-wave Observations, is an initiative to set up advanced experimental facilities, with appropriate theoretical and computational support, for a multi-institutional Indian national project in gravitational-wave astronomy. Since 2009, the IndIGO Consortium has been involved in constructing the Indian road-map for Gravitational Wave Astronomy and a phased strategy towards Indian participation in realizing the crucial gravitational-wave observatory in the Asia-Pacific region. The current major IndIGO plans on gravitational-wave astronomy relate to the LIGO-India project. LIGO-India is a planned advanced gravitational-wave detector to be located in India, to be built and operated in collaboration with the LIGO USA and its international partners Australia, Germany and the UK. The project recently received the in-principle approval from the Indian government.

NEWS Marking an eventful beginning of Gravitational Wave Astronomy Twin LIGOs detect another Binary Black Hole merger Published At: 2016-06-15 22:15 - While the celebrations for the first detection of gravitational waves are still ringing down, we are excited to announce the observation of yet another binary black hole merger by LIGO. On December 26, 2015 at 09:09AM IST the LIGO detectors in Hanford, Washington and Livingston, Louisiana detected a signal from the coalescence of two black holes, with masses 14 and 8 times the mass of the sun, merging into a more massive, rapidly rotating black hole that is 21 times the mass of the sun. The event happened 1.4 billion years ago, lasted in LIGO's frequency band for about a second and released about 1 solar mass worth of energy in that short period. For comparison, only a tiny fraction of the sun's mass gets converted to light in its entire lifetime, which is enough to keep the earth warm for billions of years. Read More ICTS Summer School on Gravitational-Wave Astronomy Published At: 2016-06-14 00:39 - 25 July - 5 Aug, 2016, ICTS, Bangalore Applications are now invited for the ICTS Summer School on Gravitational-Wave Astronomy. This summer school is mainly intended for graduate students and postdocs working on gravitational-wave astronomy and related areas, and for highly motivated undergraduate/masters students. Read More The gravitational wave discovery receives international recognition Published At: 2016-05-08 08:55 - The discovery of gravitational waves by LIGO received two major international awards last week — a Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics and the 2016 Gruber Prize in Cosmology. Read More View past news

GRAVITATIONAL WAVES The existence of gravitational waves is one of the most intriguing predictions of the General Theory of Relativity proposed by Albert Einstein in 1915. Gravitational waves are distortions in the spacetime geometry that propagate with the speed of light, analogous to ripples on the surface of a pond. On 2015 September 14, the two Advanced LIGO observatories in the USA made the first direct observation of gravitational waves passing through the earth. This signal was produced by the merger of two black holes at a distance of 1.3 billion light years. This is the first of the many expected observations of this kind, that will establish the filed of gravitational-wave astronomy, opening a new window on to the Universe. Read more INDIGO IN THE NEWS India’s future in astrophysics looks bright Gravitational wave observatory soon Rs 1,000 crore project to detect gravitational waves awaits cabinet approval LIGO detector on Indian soil under consideration: IIT-Gandhinagar 'Gravitational waves are astronomy's holy grail' LIGO detector on Indian soil under consideration: IIT-Gandhinagar LIGO detector on Indian soil under consideration: IIT-Gn Gravitational waves are astronomy's holy grail Gravitational waves hold key to cosmos U.S.-India Bilateral Cooperation on Science and Technology