The CGCA (The Leonard E. Parker Center for Gravitation, Cosmology and Astrophysics) seminars are scheduled for Fridays at 1:00 pm in in the Kenwood Interdisciplinary Research Complex (KIRC) Room KEN 2175. A “brown bag lunch” group will assemble in KEN 4118 (fourth floor kitchenette located next to the elevators) at 12:00 NOON.

What Physics Can We Learn with Gravitational Waves?
Nico Yunes, Montana State University

Title: What Physics Can We Learn with Gravitational Waves?

Einstein’s last untested prediction, the existence of gravitational waves, will soon be directly verified, for the first time, by advanced ground-based interferometers, such as LIGO and Virgo.The most interesting gravitational wave science, however, will occur after the excitement of the first detection subsides and we begin to ask what new physical information can be gained with these observations. In this talk, I will focus on the fundamental physics and the nuclear physics information that we will acquire with gravitational waves emitted in the late binary inspiral of compact objects. On the fundamental physics front, I will first review the tests that Einstein’s theory has passed in the quasi-stationary, weak field regime and then focus on the new tests we will be able to carry out in the highly-nonlinear, dynamical regime. On the nuclear physics front, I will first review some of the known unknowns in the equation of state of supranuclear matter and then focus on the information that gravitational waves will provide about the internal composition of neutron stars.