The universe is observed to be humming a particular tune, while the gravitational energy is travelling throughout the universe almost at the speed of light. As a result of this, a gentle sound wave is created. Albert Einstein (March 14, 1879 – April 18, 1955) realised this background music of the universe at least a century ago. However, he had no evidence of this. Well, the tune has recently been discovered, with astronomers making an announcement in this regard.

More than a hundred scientists were associated with this venture. They have found evidence of the background music of the universe with radio telescopes installed in North America, Europe, China, India and Australia. Scientists have claimed that a new horizon of the universe has been opened after making efforts for many years.

Scientists were not sure about this tune until 2015. However, gravitational waves produced by the collision between two supermassive black holes (each larger than our solar system) were detected by observatories in the US and Italy that year. Such catastrophic cosmic events usually produce long-frequency waves. However, researchers had been looking for low-frequency gravitational waves for decades. They used to believe that such currents were continuously swirling throughout the universe.

In search of evidence, they launched an expedition, called the International Pulsar Timing Array (IPTA). IPTA is a consortium of consortia, comprising of the European Pulsar Timing Array (EPTA), the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav), the Indian Pulsar Timing Array Project (InPTA), and the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (PPTA). Scientists from almost every continent recently confirmed that they have found evidence of a background current. Michael Keith of the EPTA has said: “We are all basically seeing the same thing. That is certainly encouraging. What we are looking at is a background of noise, with gravitational waves from all over constantly washing over the Earth.” He added: “The slightly awkward thing is that I believe nobody has reached the threshold that IPTA set out. But we do have quite a lot of confidence in the evidence. It is opening a new window and a new way of looking at the universe.”

In fact, the universe is full of gravitational currents. When gravitational currents move from one place to another through something, the space subtly contracts and expands. So, scientists started looking for evidence of this contraction and diffusion of a low-frequency gravitational current. For that, they were constantly monitoring a Pulsar, a celestial object, thought to be a rapidly rotating neutron star, which emits regular pulses of radio waves and other electromagnetic radiation at rates of up to 1,000 pulses per second. Suddenly, they discovered flashes of radio waves at a regular interval. Keith has explained: “Millisecond pulsars are one of nature’s most precise clocks, spinning neutron stars that flash radio pulses at us hundreds of times per second with unerring accuracy.” He has claimed that the EPTA prepared its data on the basis of a study of 25 brightest and most stable millisecond pulsars in the galaxy.

Scientists observed a total of 115 pulsars in the Milky Way Galaxy through radio telescopes stationed in different parts of the globe. After such a long observation, they have discovered gravitational currents and the background music of the universe. Keith, a Lecturer at Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, has compared the continuous background music to a “noisy restaurant with many people talking around you“. Meanwhile, Maura McLaughlin of the American network Pulsar Search Collaboratory has stressed that she was stunned when she had found evidence of gravitational current in 2020 for the first time. “It was a magical moment,” she said.

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Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das