Edo Berger: Gamma-Ray Bursts: The Biggest Explosions Since the Big Bang

Representing nature's biggest explosions since the Big Bang itself, gamma-ray bursts were first accidentally spotted in the 1960s by Department of Defense satellites hunting for terrestrial nuclear blasts. In this talk Prof. Berger describes the ensuing decades-long quest to decipher the origin and energy source of these mysterious explosions. He explains how gamma-ray bursts are now used to probe the first generation of stars and galaxies formed less than a billion years after the Big Bang.