S. S. Y. Chua

TL;DR: This is the first direct detection of gravitational waves and the first observation of a binary black hole merger, and these observations demonstrate the existence of binary stellar-mass black hole systems.

TL;DR: Advanced Virgo as discussed by the authors is the project to upgrade the Virgo interferometric detector of gravitational waves, with the aim of increasing the number of observable galaxies (and thus the detection rate) by three orders of magnitude.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors review the performance of the LIGO instruments during this epoch, the work done to characterize the detectors and their data, and the effect that transient and continuous noise artefacts have on the sensitivity of the detectors to a variety of astrophysical sources.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors reported the observation of a compact binary coalescence involving a 22.2 -24.3 magnitude black hole and a compact object with a mass of 2.50 -2.67 magnitude.

TL;DR: The first observational run of the Advanced LIGO detectors, from September 12, 2015 to January 19, 2016, saw the first detections of gravitational waves from binary black hole mergers as discussed by the authors.