Yesterday scientists working in the South Pole announced yesterday that they’ve discovered gravitational waves from the big bang with a confidence level greater than 5 sigma!

Not until now, anyway. In a discovery physicists are calling “huge,” “extraordinary” and “spectacular,” a team of observers using a microwave-sensitive telescope at the South Pole has found the first direct evidence of gravitational waves—and the strongest proof of inflation to date, all in one shot. “When I got the call,” says Marc Kamionkowski, a theorist at Johns Hopkins University who wasn’t involved in the research, “I had to ask if it was real. To me, this is bigger than the Higgs boson.” If it’s confirmed by other groups, says Avi Loeb, chair of the Harvard astronomy department and also not a participant in the research, “it’s worth a Nobel.”
Source: Time Magazine

Intriguingly, the BICEP2 result matches predictions for what physicists call grand unification theory. At the very high energy suggested by BICEP2, three fundamental forces in physics – the strong, weak and electromagnetic forces – should have been merged into one force. As the universe cooled and energy scales dropped, the strong force was the first to peel off from this merger, and previous theories suggested that event could have triggered inflation.
Source: NewScientist

Absolutely amazing, I’m at a loss for words… I tell Maggie, I want Brandon to be a physicist so he can do something for humanity and this is certainly super exciting stuff!