At the Limits of Astrophysics - Exploring Extreme Gravitational Phenomena

Explore the fascinating world of modern astronomy and astrophysics in this captivating lecture by Katy Clough at the Royal Institution. Delve into mind-bending concepts like gravitational waves, supermassive black holes, and exoplanets, and discover how they fit into our current understanding of physics. Learn why these astronomical phenomena often sound like science fiction and challenge our intuition about the nature of space and time. Gain insights into Einstein's theory of general relativity and its implications for strong gravity regimes, including singularities, event horizons, and time dilation around black holes. Understand how studying extreme gravitational objects helps push the boundaries of our scientific knowledge and challenges our perception of what is "natural" in the universe.