LIGO

LIGO stands for Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory. Cofounded in 1992 by Kip Thorne and Ronald Drever, of Caltech and Rainer Weiss, of MIT, LIGO is a joint project between scientists at MIT and Caltech. It is sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF). At the cost of $365 million (in 2002 USD), it has been the largest and most ambitious project ever funded by NSF (and still is as of 2004). The international LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) is a growing group of researchers, some 400 individuals at roughly 40 institutions, working to analyze the data from LIGO and other detectors, and working toward more sensitive future detectors.

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1992: 1992 was a leap year starting on Wednesday....

Kip Thorne: Kip Stephen Thorne (born June 1, 1940) is an American theoretical physicist, known for his prolific contributions in the field of gravitation physics and astrophysics. He is the current Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics at Caltech and one of the world?s leading experts on the astrophysical ...

Ronald Drever: Ron Drever is a Scottish physicist. He is currently a Professor Emeritus at the California Institute of Technology....