Astronomers saw one star warp another’s light in a way that Einstein thought we’d never see
For the first time ever, astronomers have seen a distant star warp the light of another star, making it seem as though the object changed its position in the sky. It’s a huge discovery — since even Albert Einstein didn’t think such a thing would be possible to observe. Now that we’ve proved Einstein wrong (but also right), astronomers hope to spot even more events just like this, as well as use these occurrences to learn more about the stars in our Universe.
Einstein first predicted gravitational microlensing in his theory of general relativity. It works kind of like how it sounds: it’s gravity acting like a lens that can manipulate light. Basically, supermassive objects — such as stars and black holes — warp space and time around them….
