A claim by physicists that they have finally observed gravitational waves, an elusive phenomena in the fabric of spacetime predicted by Albert Einstein a century ago, has become a hot topic for debate in the social media. The excited whispers had their basis in the recently upgraded detector at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO).

The recent sensitivity upgrade of the detector, which is split between two locations in Louisiana and Washington, was the main reason why the physicists hoped that they would be able to detect waves and, thus, herald a new era of gravitational wave astronomy.

And in case the gravitational waves have been discovered in reality, the development could be a great deal for physics, cosmology and our understanding of the universe.

Gravitational waves, as simply put by a scientist, are vibrations in the fabric of the universe or light-speed ripples in spacetime itself. These are caused by such highly violent events such as exploding stars and black hole mergers.

But like always, a majority of the physicists continue to be skeptical towards such out-of-the-box claims of historic discoveries that are made on the internet.

A well-known Arizona State University theoretical physicist and cosmologist, Lawrence Krauss, tweeted: “My earlier rumor about LIGO has been confirmed by independent sources. Stay tuned! Gravitational waves may have been discovered!! Exciting”.

Krauss had five months ago indicated that LIGO had detected signals of elusive gravitational waves. He had, in September last year, tweeted about the rumor of gravitational wave detection at LIGO detector. “Amazing if true. Will post details if it survives”, he wrote.

As pointed out by Jennifer Ouellette at Gizmodo, “Until we get any official word from LIGO, we just have to be patient and avoid jumping the gun when hearing rumors circulating on social media”.