Albert Einstein, in publicizing the theory of general relativity in 1915, predicted the existence of gravitational waves. That is, the undulation of the system formed by space and time, originated by bodies with mass. Incorrect gravitational wave remains have been measured, but we've had to wait for almost a century to find the first direct test.

The general theory of relativity was needed a few years later to complete the Big Bang theory. However, what happened in the aftermath of the great explosion, some 13.8 billion years ago, is still unknown. For a long time, many scientists have been hoping to find gravitational waves that will help them understand what happened in this short period of time.

Among the proposed explanations, the most accepted is that of cosmic inflation. According to this model, in the 10-35 seconds after the Big Bang, the volume of the universe rose up to 1040 times. I mean, the universe expanded enormously in an extremely short time. If this was the case, gravitational waves had to be forcibly dispersed through space.

These waves have been localized by the BICEP2 radio telescope located at the South Pole and the 100 antennas around it. Scientists have studied cosmic background radiation, that is, microwave radiation that was formed at the 380,000 years of the Big Bang, which is said to be the "echo" left by the Big Bang, and they've observed changes in the polarization of these microwaves. These changes, they say, can only come from the gravitational waves that originated at the time of inflation.

In the absence of definitive confirmation, the finding has impacted all cosmologists, physicists and scientists in general. More than one believes that a new era in astronomy has begun.