One of the biggest scientific claims of 2014 has received another set-back.

Back in March, a team of researchers announced that they had discovered evidence of primordial gravitational waves, hypothesized ripples in space-time whose existence would mean that the universe did indeed expand many times faster than the speed of light in the first few instants after the Big Bang, as suggested in the "cosmic inflation" theory.

The BICEP2 team saw a polarization pattern known as "B modes" in the cosmic microwave background (CMB), which is the ancient light left over from the Big Bang that created the universe 13.8 billion years ago, according to a new research paper.

Wide acceptance of the find will most likely come if other instruments pick it up too, particularly the European Space Agency's Planck satellite, which mapped out the CMB in detail from 2009 to 2013.

The Planck team followed up the BICEP2 result by analyzing data from the same patch of sky in a variety of frequencies that range from approximately 30 gigahertz to 857 gigahertz.

The news is not great for the BICEP2 crew, according to a new study.

"Unfortunately, according to our analysis, the effect of contaminants and in particular of gases present in our galaxy cannot be ruled out," co-author Carlo Baccigalupi of the International School for Advanced Studies in Trieste, Italy, said in a press statement.

The study doesn't rule out the probability that BICEP2 did see the signature of primordial gravitational waves, however.

Planck scientists are working with the discovery team to try figuring out what happened.

"We have started a collaboration with BICEP2. We are directly comparing their data with the Planck data, in the same frequency, 150 GHz, and trying to exploit the image of the contaminants we reach with Planck at other frequencies," Baccigalupi said. "This way, we hope to be able to give a definitive answer. In fact, we might find that it was indeed a contamination, but, given that we're optimists, we might even be able to exclude it with confidence."

Once the discovery is confirmed, Baccigalupi added, it "would open a completely new window onto unknown scenarios in the study of the primordial universe and very-high-energy physics."

The new study from the Planck team will be published Monday (Sept. 29) in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

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