KENNEWICK — The Trump administration wants to close one of the nation’s two cutting-edge observatories — one of them in the Tri-Cities — that made scientific history and launched a new way to study the universe.

It’s part of a $5.2 billion, or 57% cut, proposed Friday for the National Science Foundation and could result in the permanent closure of one of the special observatories, threatening the U.S.’s scientific leadership in such research.

The National Science Foundation funds two Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatories, LIGO Hanford, which is about 10 miles from Richland on unused Hanford nuclear site land, and its twin, LIGO Livingston in Louisiana.

In 2015 the two LIGOs detected gravitational waves from outer space passing through the Earth for the first time, nearly

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