March 17, 1998 Contact Ross West (541) 346-2060 Source: Jim Isenberg (541) 346-4725 EUGENE--Participants at an upcoming conference on general relativity and gravitational physics will be asking some truly mind-bending questions: What happens when black holes collide? What was the Big Bang like? What might the new supersensitive gravitational radiation detector being built in Hanford, Wash., discover? How might quantum gravity work? The two-day Pacific Coast Gravity Meeting will be held Friday and Saturday, March 20-21, at the University of Oregon. "Kip Thorne from Caltech and I started this conference 13 years ago," says James Isenberg, UO professor of mathematics. "The idea is to get together many of the people--mostly from the West Coast--who do general relativity and gravitational physics and have them discuss what they have been thinking about and working on." The conference will feature approximately 40 talks by researchers in the field, including Kip Thorne, Jim Hartle, Jim York, Beverly Berger, Richard Price and Joe Weber. The conference will take place in Room 110 of Willamette Hall, 1371 E. 13th Ave., on Friday and in Room 100 of Willamette Hall on Saturday. Events begin each day at 9 a.m. and end at about 5:30 p.m. with registration from 8 to 9 a.m. on Friday. There is no fee for the conference. For more information, contact Jim Isenberg, (541) 346-4725, or send e-mail to him at jim@newton.uoregon.edu -30- #P-7336/Local,OrSci