Cosmology, Gravitational Waves and Particles

In February 2016, physicists announced the breakthrough discovery of the gravitational waves, which were predicted by Albert Einstein in his century-old theory of General Relativity. These gravitational waves were emitted as a result of the collision of two massive black holes that happened about 1.3 billion years ago. They were discovered at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) in the United States and thus marked a new milestone for physics. However, it remains unclear to physicists how the gravitational interaction can be included in the Standard Theory of particle physics which describes the electroweak and the strong interactions in our universe.

In this volume are the lectures, given by the speakers at the conference on cosmology and particle physics. The discussed topics range from gravitational waves to cosmology, dark matter, dark energy and particle physics beyond the Standard Theory.