# NASA - Simulations Uncover 'Flashy' Secrets of Merging Black Holes 7y9AtdN4BlM

According to Einstein, whenever massive objects interact, they produce gravitational waves -- distortions in the very fabric of space and time -- that ripple outward across the universe at the speed of light. While astronomers have found indirect evidence of these disturbances, the waves have so far eluded direct detection. Ground-based observatories designed to find them are on the verge of achieving greater sensitivities, and many scientists think that this discovery is just a few years away.

Catching gravitational waves from some of the strongest sources -- colliding black holes with millions of times the sun's mass -- will take a little longer. These waves undulate so slowly that they won't be detectable by ground-based facilities. Instead, scientists will need much larger space-based instruments, such as the proposed Laser Interferometer Space Antenna, which was endorsed as a high-priority future project by the astronomical community.

A team that includes astrophysicists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., is looking forward to that day by using computational models to explore the mergers of supersized black holes. Their most recent work investigates what kind of \"flash\" might be seen by telescopes when astronomers ultimately find gravitational signals from such an event.

To explore the problem, a team led by Bruno Giacomazzo at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and including Baker developed computer simulations that for the first time show…

- Kind: Short
- Year: 2012
- Runtime: 1 min
- By: NASAexplorer
- Genres: Space
- Archive: [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NASA_-_Simulations_Uncover_%27Flashy%27_Secrets_of_Merging_Black_Holes_7y9AtdN4BlM.webm)
- Licence or status: Public domain (as the archive states it)
- Credit: NASAexplorer
- Who can watch: Tweens profiles and older (the archive gives no rating; placed by Invisible Network from its collection and subjects)

[Watch now](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/watch/archive/commons/96289194?play=1)