One of his great achievements since then, together with mathematician Roger Penrose, has been to prove that Einstein's General Theory of Relativity means space and time has a beginning in the "Big Bang" and ends in black holes.
This phenomenon is a spiral distortion of space which should if relativity is correct happen when massive bodies rotate. (In essence, such bodies drag space round with them.) Frame-dragging is predicted to cause an additional precession of one hundred-thousandth of a degree, perpendicular to that caused by the geodetic effect.
Space-time, according to Einstein's theories of relativity, is a four-dimensional fabric woven together by space and time.
The effect is a direct consequence of Einstein's theory of general relativity which tells us that space is warped by the presence of mass.
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One is Einstein's general relativity, which deals with space, time and gravity.
"Einstein's theory of general relativity tells us that mass bends space and time, so when light comes toward us through the Universe, if it passes some dark matter, its light gets bent and the image we see gets bent and distorted, " Dr Heymans told the meeting.
We know that the general theory of relativity is compatible with the existence of space-times in which travel to the past or remote future is possible.
Together, they developed Dr Ashtekar's idea to show that it implies that space and time are not smooth, as general relativity requires, but come in tiny, distinct chunks.
"From Einstein's theory of gravity, that is his general relativity theory, we believe mass curves space and this can cause light to follow a curved path, " he told BBC News Online.
The SKA will join the hunt for gravitational waves ripples in the structure of space predicted by Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity.
Einstein's theory of relativity unified these and created a four-dimensional space that is an analogue to our three-dimensional space, except that the "distance" between two points need not be positive.
Einstein's general theory of relativity states that objects with mass cause a curvature in space-time, which we perceive as gravity.
Albert Einstein published his theory of general relativity in 1916, offering a description of gravity, space and time that transformed how scientists understand the physical laws governing the known universe.
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This exploits one of the predictions of Einstein's general theory of relativity: that the path of a beam of light (which is a straight line in empty space) is bent inwards by the gravity of a massive object.
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