Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space

Theoretical physicist and professor in physics and astronomy at Barnard College of Columbia University Janna Levin, PhD relies on a playful, entertaining style to chronicle scientists’ conflicts, successes, failures, methods and discoveries. Levin’s heroes vest their hopes, careers and lives into pursuing possible phantoms – the gravitational waves from distant galaxies that Einstein predicted. Their quest engendered bitter rivalries, crushed dreams and broken hearts among elite scientists.

A Cosmic Haystack

When black holes collide, releasing more energy than a billion suns, they produce a slight ring made by gravitational waves, which travel through the cosmos. Almost undetectable, gravitational waves reveal the universe’s origins, eventual oblivion and perhaps rebirth.