Gravity! The Big Bang, Black Holes and Gravitational Waves
Paris Diderot
  • Start Date: 30 Jan, 2017
  • 6 weeks
  • Study Content: Videos


Gravity runs the Universe. This free online course explains why, exploring gravitational waves, black holes and the Big Bang.

Course Fee: Free
Certificate Cost: See Fees and Eligibility

Course Description

What is gravity? This fundamental force is the common theme between concepts as intriguing as the Big Bang, black holes, dark energy, space-time, gravitational waves and the expansion of the Universe.


If these concepts pique your interest, this free online course is for you. It doesn’t require any background in physics or mathematics, just a simple curiosity about the Universe and our place in it.


Discover why the discovery of gravitational waves in 2016 is a real scientific revolution


The theory of gravity, Einstein’s theory of relativity, was published in 1915. This course presents in a simple way the main ideas behind this theory, before explaining why “gravity is the engine of the Universe.”


We will also explore the 2016 discovery of gravitational waves – a phenomenon that Einstein predicted exactly 100 years ago.
By the end of the course, we’ll find out:



  • why, the further you look, the more distant the past is;

  • how we can tell what happened just after the Big Bang;

  • what the dark components of the Universe are;

  • what happens when you cross the horizon of a black hole;

  • why the discovery of gravitational waves is opening an extraordinary exploration of our Universe and our space-time.


Learn with gravity experts including a Nobel Prize-winning physicist


Over six weeks, you’ll learn with Pierre Binétruy, the Director of the Paris Centre for Cosmological Physics at Paris Diderot University, as well as the cosmologist, George Smoot, who will explain the discovery that earned him the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2006.


This course doesn’t require any background in physics or mathematics, just a simple curiosity about the Universe.


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    • Paris Diderot

      Situated in the heart of Paris, Université Paris Diderot is the only multidisciplinary university in Paris to offer a wide range of degrees in the Humanities, Medicine and the Sciences.

      Since April 2009, the University - Université Paris Diderot - has been part of Sorbonne Paris Cité, a consortium of four universities and four leading French academic institutions : Sorbonne Nouvelle (Paris 3), Paris Descartes (Paris 5), Paris Diderot (Paris 7), Paris 13 (associate member), the Paris Institute of Earth Physics [Institut de physique du globe de Paris], the French National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilisations (INALCO), the Paris Institute of Political Science (“Sciences Po”) and the EHESP School of Public Health [Ecole des hautes études en santé publique].

      With its 26,000 students, 20% of whom are international, its 2,000 faculty and its 92 research laboratories, it is a major actor in European higher education and research. According to its own tradition and humanist principles set out by eighteenth-century encyclopaedist Denis Diderot, the university’s ambition is to enlighten 21st-century society by opening up new fields of study, renewing traditional disciplines, developing and enhancing the achievements and results of research, and connecting with the community at large.

      The University relocated its central administration and most of its departments in a newly developing area of Paris – known as Paris Rive Gauche – a few streets south east of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. Former industrial buildings have been rehabilitated, thus preserving an important link with the history of Paris, while brand new ones have also been commissioned from world-class architects.

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