Physicists Simulated What Might Happen When Two Wormholes Collide, And Things Got Weird - ScienceAlert

An artist's impression of two black holes colliding. Interacting wormholes could produce a similar gravitational wave signature. (Mark Garlick/Science Photo Library RF/Getty Images)

Like the surface of an ocean, the fabric of the Universe is constantly rippling with an infinitude of gravitational waves, propagating outward across the cosmos. We can count, in triple digits, the number of these ripples we've detected to date – and most of them have been linked to collisions between black holes, the densest objects in the Universe. But how do we know that every collision attributed to black holes is what it looks like? And what of the gravitational wave signatures we are yet to detect? What if there's something else out there that can make the Universe sing? What if colliding wormholes can make a similar splash – and how would we recognize it when we find it? For one particular kind of wormhole, at least, new simulations suggest collisions would be profoundly strange – and could leave distinctive signatures in the fabric of spacetime. According to a preprint authored by physicist Nikita M.