Ripples in spacetime from both the merger of supermassive black holes and from the Big Bang can potentially be distinguished by the "beats" one of them plays, a new study suggests.
During the moment of the Big Bang, "quantum fluctuations" in the universe expanded in tandem with space ballooning outward, producing what are known as primordial gravitational waves. In theory, those waves should still ripple through the universe today. They would be joined by gravitational waves coming from various other sources, such as supermassive black holes that have collided and merged in different galaxies. Together, these waves as well as the Big Bang ones should produce a background of faint ripples throughout the cosmos. So, how do we find the ripples?
