Gravitational Waves which are solutions of the linearised Einstein equations were for many years a controversial issue concerning their existence. The discovery of a binary pulsar whose orbital period changes in accordance with the predicted gravitational wave emission put an end to that controversy. However, this compelling evidence of their existence did not provide any clue on their form and effects. The current theory, owing to the nonlinear nature of gravitation, faces difficulties to deal with all aspects of the Gravitational Waves and some points still remain obscure. The aim of the 8th Aegean Summer School is to discuss various aspects of Gravitational Waves from theory to observations, report on the current and future status of gravitational detection experiments. The Aegean School is mainly addressed to postgraduate students and young researchers aiming at introducing them to this very challenging topic that recently has attracted much interest. It is also addressed to the members of research program "Investigation of certain higher derivative term field theories and gravity models" because of expected connection of gravitational waves to high curvature and high derivative gravity theories.

Various aspects of gravitational waves will be discussed: Introduction to the theory of Gravitational Waves, Gravitational Collapse, Primordial Gravitational Waves, Gravitational Waves from modified gravity, Gravitational Waves and AdS/CFT, Gravitational waves and Quantum Gravity, Gravitational Waves and massive gravity, Gravitational waves detection (theory and status), Astrophysics of Sources of Gravitational Radiation (compact objects, binaries, bursts}, Modeling Sources of Gravitational Radiation, Data Analysis of Sources of Gravitational Radiation, Multi-messenger Astrophysics, Status of Gravitational detection experiments.

The invited speakers include: E. Bergshoeff, M. Barsuglia, E. Berti, P. Binétruy,  E. Chassande-Mottin, M. Dafermos,  K.  Glampedakis, W. van Holten, M. Kramer, S. Kuroyanagi, P. Laguna, M. Maggiore, L.Rezzolla, D. Shoemaker,  D. Shoemaker , N. Stergioulas, R. Troncoso.

The school will take place in Rethymno in Crete in the Cultural Centre (Bernardou 12, Old Town) of the Municipality of Rethymno. The morning sessions will consist of mainly review talks on major topics of the field, while in the afternoon sessions short talks will be given on current research topics. Those graduate and postgraduate students interested in attending the school are requested to send a short CV and one recommendation letter to the School's Secretary

The 8th Aegean Summer School is organized and sponsored by the University of Tuebingen, the Technical University of Athens, the Groningen University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Laboratory Astroparticule et Cosmologie (APC), the General Secretariat for Research and Technology, NSRF programme (Πρόγραμμα ΕΣΠΑ). It is also sponsored by the Municipality of Rethymno and Springer international publisher.