Interior of LIGO at Hanford, Washington Fulldome

LIGO, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory, consists of two widely-separated interferometers within the United States — one in Hanford, Washington and the other in Livingston, Louisiana — operated in unison to detect gravitational waves. Here the Hanford facility is seen. LIGO was designed to open the field of gravitational-wave astrophysics through the direct detection of gravitational waves predicted by Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. The multi-kilometer-scale gravitational wave detectors use laser interferometry to measure the minute ripples in space-time caused by passing gravitational waves from cataclysmic cosmic events such as colliding neutron stars or black holes, or by supernovae.