The existence of gravitational waves (GW), predicted by Einstein in 2016 and experimentally discovered by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration (LVK) in 2015, gave rise to one of the fastest growing subfields in physics, e.g. recognized by the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2017. At the VUB, at the initiative of prof. dr. Alexander Sevrin and already early on joined by prof. dr. Alberto Mariotti, gravitational wave research started in 2018. This effort, originally embedded in the Theoretical High Energy Physics group is now a concerted effort within the large research group HEP@VUB. Indeed, thanks to the Strategic Research Program (SRP) HEP@VUB, financial support was available to establish a flourishing subgroup focusing on GW physics and active in Virgo, ETpathfinder and the Einstein Telescope. That seed money allowed the group to obtain further external financing resulting in the VUB now playing a very visible role in the LVK, in particular Virgo, collaboration. Dr. Alba Romero-RodrÃguez, when still a PhD student in Barcelona, was already one of the brightest and most visible young members of Virgo. Immediately after successfully defending her PhD she joined the physics department at the VUB in 2022 as a postdoc (financed by the SRP HEP@VUB).
Dr. Alba is one of the three winners of the third edition of the Virgo award, given by the international Virgo Collaborations, to young scientists for their significant contribution to the operation of the experiment and the rsults of the Virgo Collaboration.
Link to the Virgo page: https://www.virgo-gw.eu/news/winners-of-the-virgo-awards-2023-announced/