IndIGO News and Press Releases

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology (Caltech) hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. In order to support the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by LIGO-India Science Collaboration, as part of this program.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology (Caltech) hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. In order to support the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by LIGO-India Science Collaboration, as part of this program.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology (Caltech) hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. In order to support the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by LIGO-India Science Collaboration, as part of this program.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. In consideration of the upcoming LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

Rana Adhikari, professor of physics at California Institute of Technology was awarded the New Horizons Prize in fundamental physics, “for research on present and future ground-based detectors of gravitational waves.” The prize is shared with Matthew Evans and Lisa Barsotti of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Awarded by the same foundation that issues the Breakthrough Prizes, the New Horizons Prizes honors early-career achievements in physics and mathematics. 

Theoretical physicist Bala Iyer has been recently conferred an honorary doctorate by the Central University of Karnataka "in recognition of his meritorious contributions to the field of Science.” Professor Iyer has made pioneering contributions to the calculation of expected gravitational-wave signals from inspiralling binaries of black holes and neutron stars — the kind of signals that was recently detected by LIGO and Virgo.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. In consideration of the upcoming LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

17 August 2017 saw a major breakthrough in astronomy, when gravitational waves from a pair of colliding neutron stars were detected for the first time by the US-based Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and the Europe-based Virgo. This happens to be the strongest gravitational-wave signal detected so far, owing to the relatively close location of about 130 million light-years from earth. The detection was also confirmed by a large number of telescopes around the world that studied various forms of radiation from the merger. This is a new milestone in the success saga of advanced gravitational wave detectors, which have announced the discoveries of four black hole mergers to date. The first such detection in 2015 led to the awarding of the Nobel prize in physics this year.

This year’s Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Rainer Weiss, Barry C. Barish and Kip S. Thorne of the LIGO/VIRGO Collaboration "for decisive contributions to the LIGO detector and the observation of gravitational waves”.

The LIGO observatories in the USA observed the gravitational-wave signals from yet another merging black hole pair. This time, LIGO was joined by the Virgo observatory from Europe, which significantly contributed to the improved localization of this astronomical source in the sky, and enabled new tests of Einstein's theory based on the polarization of gravitational waves.

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) has made another successful detection of gravitational waves, ripples in space and time, from the merger of two massive black holes that happened three billion light years away. This firmly reiterates the remarkable launch, announced last year, of a new window of astronomy.

Professor C. V. Vishveshwara, who passed away in Bangalore recently, was one of the true pioneers of black hole physics. His notable contributions include the proof of the stability of Schwarzschild black holes and the discovery of quasi-normal modes of black holes.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. In consideration to the upcoming LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

Advanced LIGO Engineering Team has been awarded the Paul F. Foreman Team Engineering Excellence Award from the Optical Society. This award recognizes technical achievements such as product engineering, process, software and patent development, as well as contributions to society such as engineering education, publication and management, and furthering public appreciation of optical engineering.

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.

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.

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.

On March 31, the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and India's Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) and Department of Science and Technology (DST) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to lead the way for establishing an advanced gravitational-wave detector in India. The MOU was jointly signed by the NSF Director Dr. France A. Córdova and the DAE secretary Dr. Sekhar Basu in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

2016 Apr 4--8, Bangalore

On 2016 February 11, the LIGO-Virgo collaborations jointly announced the discovery of gravitational waves. The signal, produced by the collision of two black holes in the distance universe, was detected by two LIGO observatories on 2015 September 14. This confirms a major prediction of Einstein’s general theory of relativity and opens a new observational window onto the universe.

For the first time, scientists have observed ripples in the fabric of spacetime called gravitational waves, arriving at the earth from a cataclysmic event in the distant universe. This confirms a major prediction of Albert Einstein’s 1915 general theory of relativity and opens an unprecedented new window onto the cosmos.

From the Media Advisory issued by LIGO Scientific Collaboration

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. Considering the imminent possibility of the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

28 December 2015 - 1 January 2016
M A College of Engineering, Kothamangalam, Kerala

IUCAA Resource Centre, CUSAT, Kochi in collaboration with the Department of Physics, M A College of Arts and Science, Kothamangalam is organising a National School on Gravitational Waves.

The Advanced LIGO gravitational-wave observatories in the USA have been officially dedicated in a ceremony held on Tuesday, May 19, at the LIGO Hanford facility in Richland, Washington state. This marks a major step in the international effort for the first direct detection of gravitational waves.

29 Jun 2015 to 10 Jul 2015, Bangalore

The International Centre for Theoretical Sciences, TIFR is organizing a Summer School on Gravitational Wave Astronomy in Bangalore from The school is aimed at training students and young researchers in the emerging area of gravitational-wave astronomy.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. Considering the imminent possibility of the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

The season of graduate-school applications in several universities in North America and Europe is rapidly approaching. A number of universities part of the LIGO-Virgo collaboration host vibrant research groups in various branches of gravitational-wave physics and astronomy, and are looking for bright and well-motivated students.

2014 Sept 20-27, IIT Kanpur

The five day school on Optics of Gravitational Wave Detectors aims to provide a broad introduction to experimental techniques of interferometric gravitational wave detectors such as LIGO. The course includes tutorials on fundamentals of optics and related areas required for an understanding of GW detectors.

A satellite workshop on Gravitational Wave Astronomy will be held on 19 March 2014, one day before the Astronomical Society of India (ASI) Meeting (20-22 March 2014) at IISER-Mohali. The workshop is partially supported by the local organizers of ASI Meeting and the Max the Planck Partner Group on Gravitational Waves at IISER-Thiruvananthapuram.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO SURF Program. Considering the imminent possibility of the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

GEO600 is a 600m long interferometric GW detector located near Hannover, Germany and run by the Albert Einstein Institute in Hannover.  As the other large interferometer sites are currently installing the next generation of instruments, GEO600 is the only place where experience can be gained on an operating, interferometric GW detector.  The GEO600 group invites applications in the post-doctoral or graduate researcher level.  The main lines of research currently pursued are increasing the laser power, integrating a squeezed light source, novel control schemes, and searching for unexplained sources of noise.  Independent of what the work turns out to be, because of the large similarity between all GW interferometers, experience gained at GEO600 will prove to be invaluable to those looking toward commissioning the next generation of instruments.

23-28 Dec, 2013
Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology, Indore

Applications are now invited for the ICTS Winter School on Experimental Gravitational-Wave Physics, organized by the International Centre for Theoretical Sciences, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Bangalore. The school will be held at the Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology, Indore from 23 to 28 December, 2013.

December 17- 20, 2013
Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune, India

This year’s Gravitational Wave Physics and Astronomy Workshop (GWPAW) will be held at IUCAA, Pune during December 17- 20, 2013. GWPAW is an open annual workshop on the physics and astronomy of gravitational waves (GWs), techniques for their detection, and interpretation of data and results. Formerly, the GWPAW was called the GWDAW. This conference is one of the special events being hosted by IUCAA to mark 25 years of its existence.



Applications are now invited for the Summer School on Numerical Relativity organized by the International Centre for Theoretical Sciences of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (ICTS-TIFR), Bangalore. The school is organized as part of the ICTS Program on Numerical Relativity and will be held from 2013 June 10 to 21 in the ICTS-TIFR facility located in the campus of the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.

LIGO Laboratory at California Institute of Technology hosts a 10-week summer student research program every year, called the LIGO-REU Program. Considering the imminent possibility of the LIGO-India project, LIGO has graciously agreed to host a few talented and motivated undergraduate students from Indian institutions, pre-selected by IndIGO, as part of this program.

Bala R. Iyer, theoretical physicist at Raman Research Institute and chairperson of the IndIGO consortium has been elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS). Professor Iyer is one of the pioneers in modeling the dynamics and gravitational waves from the inspiral of compact-object binaries (black holes and neutron stars) employing post-Newtonian theory. Searches for gravitational wave from inspiralling compact binaries (which are among the most promising astrophysical sources for the first detection of gravitational waves) crucially depend on the theoretical ‘templates’ of the expected signals, as computed by post-Newtonian theory and numerical relativity. Professor Iyer also played a leading role in building an active community of gravitational-wave physicists in India and is a key organizer of the proposed LIGO-India initiative.

17 – 21 December 2012, BITS Campus, Goa

The BITS-IUCAA Workshop on Gravitational-Wave Data Analysis is intended for students, young researchers and teachers who are motivated to pursue future studies in Gravitational-Wave Astronomy. A series of lectures and hands-on training sessions are aimed to initiate the participants to current research problems on Gravitational-Wave Astronomy.

July 11 - 13, 2012
Raman Research Institute, Bangalore

The ASTROD5 meeting aims to bring together researchers from diverse subfields of physics, astrophysics and solar-system exploration, having in common an interest in cosmology, gravitation, fundamental physics, and solar-system physics. Theoretical as well as experimental aspects will be explored. The focus of the conference will be both on technology and science. Several sessions will be devoted to innovative ideas for space-based experiments.

The science funding agencies in India and USA are currently evaluating the feasibility of constructing a joint Indo-US gravitational-wave (GW) observatory in India, called LIGO-India.

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) project operates three GW detectors at two sites in USA. Currently these observatories are being upgraded to their advanced configurations (called Advanced LIGO). The proposed LIGO-India project aims to build one Advanced LIGO detector in India using the components intended for the second detector at the Hanford site in Washington state.

The IndIGO consortium has been accepted as a member research group of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC). LSC is an international collaboration of scientists working on gravitational-wave-observation program, and is responsible for analyzing the data collected by the LIGO observatories in the USA and the GEO 600 observatory in Germany.

The Indian Initiative in Gravitational-Wave Observations (IndIGO) has been accepted as the newest member of the Gravitational Wave International Committee (GWIC). This marks an important recognition to the consortium by the international gravitational-wave (GW) community. GWIC was formed in 1997 to facilitate international collaboration and cooperation in the construction, operation and use of the major GW detection facilities worldwide. GWIC is affiliated with the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics, and the International Society on General Relativity and Gravitation.

The IndIGO consortium is organizing a mock gravitational-wave (GW) data challenge for students. Simulated data of a future GW observatory called "Indigo" will be provided containing simulated GW signals from inspiralling binary black holes. Participants will be asked to detect these signals using the detection algorithms that they have developed, and to report the recovered parameters of the black-hole binaries.

The Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF) has funded an Indo-US Center for gravitational-wave physics and astronomy. The center will facilitate collaboration between Indian and US scientists working in the emerging field of gravitational-wave (GW) astronomy, with an eye to consolidating the Indo-US collaboration in GW-theory and data analysis, and extending it for setting up large-scale experimental facilities, and building related technological expertise in India.

1 - 23 December, 2011
IUCAA, Pune and Holiday Inn, Goa.

The International Centre for Theoretical Sciences is organizing a comprehensive programme covering frontline areas of research in Gravitation and Cosmology. The programme consists of a school on Cosmology and Gravity Waves (to be held in Pune), an International Conference on Gravitation and Cosmology (to be held in Goa) and a workshop on Gravitational-Wave Astronomy (in Pune).

November 1 - 2, 2011, Pune, India

The European Gravitational Observatory (EGO) in collaboration with IndIGO is organizing a joint workshop on gravitational waves. The meeting will be held at the Inter University Center for Astronomy & Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune during November 1-2, 2011. The meeting is supported by the Embassy of Italy in New Delhi and IUCAA, Pune.

Feb 8 - 10, 2011, New Delhi, India

The IndIGO Consortium is organizing a meeting (supported under AISTF project DST/INT/AUS/P-26/2009) of the Indo-Australian collaboration and scientists from American LIGO during Feb 8-10, 2011 in Delhi. This meeting is a crucial step to bring together the key Australian, American and Indian collaborators to discuss the possibilities and plan for the logistics of the Indian participation in the planned LIGO-Australia project, and leading on towards building significant Indian presence in gravitational-wave Astronomy over the next decade.

13 - 24 December 2010
University of Delhi

The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai has approved and funded the proposal for the construction of a 3-meter scale advanced interferometer prototype. The interferometer will be built initially at the Mumbai campus of TIFR. Stressing on the lead TIFR has always taken in initiating frontier research areas, the Director and the Dean of Natural Sciences Faculty of the TIFR expressed their keen interest in seeding and developing experimental gravitational-wave research in India.

13 - 24 December 2010
University of Delhi

13 - 24 December 2010
University of Delhi

13-24 December 2010
University of Delhi

The IndIGO collaboration, in collaboration with the IUCAA Resource Center at the University of Delhi is organizing an introductory school on gravitational-wave astronomy. This introductory school is aimed to expose the students to the emerging and exciting research frontier of gravitational wave astronomy.

An investigation by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration has significantly advanced our understanding of the early evolution of the universe. Analysis of data taken over a two-year period (2005-2007) has set the most stringent limits yet on the amount of gravitational waves that could have come from the Big Bang in the gravitational wave frequency band where LIGO can observe. In doing so, the gravitational-wave scientists have put new constraints on the details of how the universe looked in its earliest moments.