(invited by Prof Jacob Bekenstein)
Title:
Testing General Relativity in the Strong-Field, Dynamical Regime
Abstract
Future tests of general relativity will involve probing the regime of
strong, highly dynamical fields. In this lecture, we will describe some of
the opportunities, including testing the no-hair theorems of black holes by
tracking stars near our galactic center black hole. The detection of
gravitational radiation will open a new window on the universe and provide
new opportunities for testing general relativity, including bounding the
mass of the graviton, testing the non-linear dynamics of black-hole mergers,
and doing black-hole spectroscopy to test the no-hair theorems.