WATCH: The Emotional Moment When a Physicist Learns His Theory about The Big Bang Is Supported after 30 Years

In this Stanford University video, physicist Andrei Linde is surprised with the first direct evidence that supports his theoretical work, the cosmic inflation theory of how the universe formed. He learned the good news when Chao-Lin Kuo, an assistant professor who was part of the team that found evidence of gravitational waves caused by the Big Bang via the BICEP2 telescope at the South Pole, showed up at his front door to pop open a celebratory bottle of champagne. “Let’s just hope that it is not a trick,” Linde says in the clip.

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