From Commotion to Locomotion: the 2027 School on Gravity
Understanding the gravitational interaction is one of the great scientific endeavors of the 21st century. The Nobel Prize-winning discovery of gravitational waves in 2015, and subsequent detections by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration, have marked a revolutionary step forward in physics and astrophysics by opening an entirely new window for exploring the Universe. Future upgrades to these detectors, along with upcoming facilities such as LISA and the Einstein Telescope, promise even more breakthrough discoveries that the next generation of scientists will need to interpret.
The School on Gravity (21–25 June 2027, Copenhagen) will introduce junior scientists—graduate students and advanced undergraduates with a background in general relativity—to a wide range of foundational topics in the exciting new field of gravitational wave physics. Topics will span from the theory of motion, to new challenges introduced by quantum physics, to the astrophysics of black holes and source modeling for gravitational-wave detectors.
The program is as follows:
Lectures on Numerical Relativity and Strong Field Dynamics. Why, how, challenges. Status of two-body problem, beyond vacuum General Relativity, and requirements for future detectors.
Lecturer: Katy Clough (Queen Mary University of London)
Lectures on Self-force and Astrophysics. Black hole perturbation scheme, self-force in electromagnetic and gravitational-wave science, environments.
Lecturer: Beatrice Bonga (Radboud University)*
Lectures on Gravitational-Wave Science. How is gravitational-wave data analyzed? how do we find signals? what are current/upcoming main challenges? Have we seen strong-field effects? How to test astrophysical environments and extensions of General Relativity?
Lecturer: Aditya Vijaykumar (University of Chicago)
Lectures on Art, History and Philosophy in Black Hole Physics and Science.
Lecturers: Peter Galison (Harvard University), Sjoerd Knibbeler (University of Amsterdam)
Please apply at the School on Gravity website. We require submission of a single pdf file containing a two-page CV, up to half a page motivation letter, and a signed support letter from an advisor on letterhead.
Deadline: February 01, 2027. The number of seats is limited, so we encourage you to apply as soon as possible.
The School on Gravity will take place in the legendary Auditorium A of the Niels Bohr Institute, inviting students and lecturers to challenge current paradigms in gravitational physics in the spirit of the quantum revolution that unfolded in this very room. This is the second edition of the annual school organized by the Center of Gravity (CoG).
Scientific Organizing Committee: Vitor Cardoso (Director of CoG), Emil Bjerrum-Bohr, Jose Ezquiaga, Troels Harmark, Niels Obers, Marta Orselli, Alessia Platania, Johan Samsing, Maarten van de Meent, Ziqi Yan.
Local Organizing Committee: Dogan Akpinar, Vitor Cardoso, Bertil Cold, Francesco Del Porro, Jose M. Ezquiaga, Christos Kristaki, Emily Kate Mansfield, Fanny Töpper, Guangzi Xu, Serdar Yildiz.
Contact: sog@the-center-of-gravity.com
Oct. 7, 2026, 3:56 p.m.