Two major events took place two weeks after New Year's Eve.
The famous [Science] journal selected the top ten scientific and technological progress of 2016.
The research on gravitational waves was the last piece of the general relativity theory puzzle, so it was not surprising that it won the top spot.
If the invention of the electromagnetic telescope was like the human eye, then the gravitational waves detector was like the human ear. Humans could finally listen to the sounds of the universe.
Ranked second was Mycoplasma laboratorium 3.0, also called Syn 3.0. Contrast to gravitational waves, most people did not know what Syn 3.0 was. However, Syn 3.0 was the closest humans had ever gotten to becoming gods.
Sitting at 473 genes, tt contained the minimum amount of genes necessary for life-sustaining activities. At the same time, this was the simplest living organism humans had ever created.