【摘要】 引力波爆发事件GW150914的发现,标志着引力波天文学时代的到来,它为人类打开了全新的窗口来研究强引力场、极致密天体、极高能过程、极早期宇宙等极端物理过程和现象。介绍广义相对论中引力波的基本性质、观测效应以及主要的产生机制。并着重介绍宇宙中的几类比较重要的引力波源的主要性质、探测方法,以及探测现状和未来展望。具体包括:旋转的中子星、稳定的双星系统等连续的引力波源,超新星爆发、双星并合等爆发式的引力波源,以及天体物理过程和宇宙暴胀产生的随机引力波背景。更多还原

【Abstract】 The recent discovery of gravitational-wave burst GW150914 marks the coming of a new era of gravitational-wave astronomy, which provides a new window to study the physics in the strong gravitational fields, the extremely massive stars,extremely high energy processes and extremely early Universe. In this article, we introduce the basic characters of gravitational wave in Einstein’s general relativity, their observational effects and main generation mechanisms, including the rotation of neutron stars, the evolution of binary systems,the spontaneous generation in the inflation universe. Different sources produce the gravitational waves at quite different frequencies, which can be detected by different methods. In the lowest frequency range(f < 10^-15 Hz), the detection is mainly dependent of the observation of B-mode polarization of cosmic microwave background radiation. In the middle frequency range(10^-9 < f < 10^-6 Hz), one detects gravitational waves by analyzing the timing residuals of millisecond second pulsars. In the high frequency range(10^-4 < f < 10⁴ Hz), it can be detected by space-based and ground-based laser interferometers. In particular, we focus on the main features, detection methods, detection status and the future prospects for several important sources, including the continuous sources（e.g. spinning neutron stars, stable binary systems）, the burst sources（e.g. supernovae, the mergence of binary system）, and the stochastic backgrounds generated by the astrophysical and cosmological process. In addition,we forecast the potential breakthrough processes in gravitational-wave astronomy in the near future, and the Chinese projects which might involve in these discoveries.更多还原