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Author: Don E. Wilhelms
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 544
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Book Description
When human exploration of the lunar surface began in 1969, it marked not only an unprecedented technological achievement but also the culmination of scientific efforts to understand lunar geology. Memoirs of the Apollo astronauts have preserved the exploratory aspects of these missions; now a geologist who was an active participant in the lunar program offers a detailed historical view of those events--including the pre-Apollo era--from a heretofore untold scientific perspective. It was the responsibility of the scientific team of which Don Wilhelms was a member to assemble an overall picture of the Moon's structure and history in order to recommend where on the lunar surface fieldwork should be conducted and samples collected. His book relates the site-selection process in detail, and draws in concomitant events concerning mission operations to show how they affected the course of the scientific program. While discussing all six landings in detail, it tells the behind-the-scenes story of telescopic and spacecraft investigations before, during, and after the manned landings. Intended for anyone interested the space program, the history of science, or the application of geology to planetology, To a Rocky Moon will leave all readers with a better idea of what the Moon is really like. In so expertly summarizing this earlier phase of exploration, it stands as an authoritative touchstone for those involved in the next.
Author: Don E. Wilhelms
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 544
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Book Description
When human exploration of the lunar surface began in 1969, it marked not only an unprecedented technological achievement but also the culmination of scientific efforts to understand lunar geology. Memoirs of the Apollo astronauts have preserved the exploratory aspects of these missions; now a geologist who was an active participant in the lunar program offers a detailed historical view of those events--including the pre-Apollo era--from a heretofore untold scientific perspective. It was the responsibility of the scientific team of which Don Wilhelms was a member to assemble an overall picture of the Moon's structure and history in order to recommend where on the lunar surface fieldwork should be conducted and samples collected. His book relates the site-selection process in detail, and draws in concomitant events concerning mission operations to show how they affected the course of the scientific program. While discussing all six landings in detail, it tells the behind-the-scenes story of telescopic and spacecraft investigations before, during, and after the manned landings. Intended for anyone interested the space program, the history of science, or the application of geology to planetology, To a Rocky Moon will leave all readers with a better idea of what the Moon is really like. In so expertly summarizing this earlier phase of exploration, it stands as an authoritative touchstone for those involved in the next.
Author: Kathy Sawyer
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1588365271
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 398
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Book Description
In this riveting book, acclaimed journalist Kathy Sawyer reveals the deepest mysteries of space and some of the most disturbing truths on Earth. The Rock from Mars is the story of how two planets and the spheres of politics and science all collided at the end of the twentieth century. It began sixteen million years ago. An asteroid crashing into Mars sent fragments flying into space and, eons later, one was pulled by the Earth’s gravity onto an icy wilderness near the southern pole. There, in 1984, a geologist named Roberta Score spotted it, launching it on a roundabout path to fame and controversy. In its new home at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, the rock languished on a shelf for nine years, a victim of mistaken identity. Then, in 1993, the geochemist Donald “Duck” Mittlefehldt, unmasked the rock as a Martian meteorite. Before long, specialist Chris Romanek detected signs of once-living organisms on the meteorite. And the obscure rock became a rock star. But how did nine respected investigators come to make such startling claims about the rock that they triggered one of the most venomous scientific battles in modern memory? The narrative traces the steps that led to this risky move and follows the rippling impact on the scientists’ lives, the future of space exploration, the search for life on Mars, and the struggle to understand the origins of life on Earth. From the second the story broke in Science magazine in 1996, it spawned waves of excitement, envy, competitive zeal, and calculation. In academia, in government agencies, in laboratories around the world, and even in the Oval Office–where an inquisitive President Clinton had received the news in secret– players of all kinds plotted their next moves. Among them: David McKay, the dynamic geologist associated with the first moon landing, who labored to achieve at long last a second success; Bill Schopf of UCLA, a researcher determined to remain at the top of his field and the first to challenge McKay’s claims; Dan Goldin, the boss of NASA; and Dick Morris, the controversial presidential adviser who wanted to use the story for Clinton’s reelection and unfortunately made sure it ended up in the diary of a $200-an-hour call girl. Impeccably researched and thrillingly involving, Kathy Sawyer’s The Rock from Mars is an exemplary work of modern nonfiction, a vivid account of the all-too-human high-stakes drive to learn our true place in the cosmic scheme.
Author: Dana Mackenzie
Publisher: Turner Publishing Company
ISBN: 0470348836
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 212
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Book Description
The first popular book to explain the dramatic theory behind the Moon's genesis This lively science history relates one of the great recent breakthroughs in planetary astronomy-a successful theory of the birth of the Moon. Science journalist Dana Mackenzie traces the evolution of this theory, one little known outside the scientific community: a Mars-sized object collided with Earth some four billion years ago, and the remains of this colossal explosion-the Big Splat-came together to form the Moon. Beginning with notions of the Moon in ancient cosmologies, Mackenzie relates the fascinating history of lunar speculation, moving from Galileo and Kepler to George Darwin (son of Charles) and the Apollo astronauts, whose trips to the lunar surface helped solve one of the most enigmatic mysteries of the night sky: who hung the Moon? Dana Mackenzie (Santa Cruz, CA) is a freelance science journalist. His articles have appeared in such magazines as Science, Discover, American Scientist, The Sciences, and New Scientist.
Author: Bill Leatherbarrow
Publisher: Reaktion Books
ISBN: 1780239556
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 272
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Book Description
The moon has always been the most obvious feature in our night sky. It is our nearest celestial neighbour, orbiting the earth at an average distance of 384,400 kilometers, and is large enough to display significant detail even to the unaided eye. Our moon has drawn observers since the dawn of humankind, and all people have tried to make sense of the puzzles it poses and the questions it raises. The moon provided our ancient ancestors with one of the earliest means of keeping and measuring time, and many early religions had cults that worshipped it. When it eclipses the sun it provides one of the most awe-inspiring views in nature. In The Moon, celebrated amateur astronomer Bill Leatherbarrow provides expert insight into the history of our study of this compelling astronomical body. Drawing on his own decades of lunar observation, he describes how and why the observation and study of the moon has evolved, particularly in the age of telescopic study. He also offers an overview of current scientific thinking and developments in lunar science since the advent of the Space Age, even providing practical advice on how to make your own observations of the moon. Extensively illustrated with images of the lunar surface taken both from spacecraft and using amateur equipment, this book is an accessible introduction to complex astrophysical concepts that will give all amateur astronomers and anyone fascinated by this natural satellite something to moon over.
Author: George E. Webb
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
ISBN: 0816544042
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 296
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Book Description
As a site of scientific activity, the Southwest may be best known for atomic research at Los Alamos and astronomical observations at Kitt Peak. But as George Webb shows, these twentieth-century endeavors follow a complex history of discovery that dates back to Spanish colonial times, and they point toward an exciting future. Ranging broadly over the natural and human sciences, Webb shows that the Southwest—specifically Arizona, New Mexico, and west Texas—began as a natural laboratory that attracted explorers interested in its flora, fauna, and mineral wealth. Benjamin Silliman's mining research in the nineteenth century, for example, marked the development of the region as a colonial outpost of American commerce, and A. E. Douglass's studies of climatic cycles through tree rings attest to the rise of institutional research. World War II and the years that followed brought more scientists to the region, seeking secluded outposts for atomic research and clear skies for astronomical observations. What began as a colony of the eastern scientific establishment soon became a self-sustaining scientific community. Webb shows that the rise of major institutions—state universities, observatories, government labs—proved essential to the growth of Southwest science, and that government support was an important factor not only in promoting scientific research at Los Alamos but also in establishing agricultural and forestry experiment stations. And in what had always been a land of opportunity, women scientists found they had greater opportunity in the Southwest than they would have had back east. All of these factors converged at the end of the last century, with the Southwest playing a major role in NASA's interplanetary probes. While regionalism is most often used in studying culture, Webb shows it to be equally applicable to understanding the development of science. The individuals and institutions that he discusses show how science was established and grew in the region and reflect the wide variety of research conducted. By joining Southwest history with the history of science in ways that illumine both fields, Webb shows that the understanding of regional science is essential to a complete understanding of the Southwest.
Author: David S. F. Portree
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Extravehicular activity (Manned space flight)
Languages : en
Pages : 148
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Book Description
Author: Gunter Faure
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1402055447
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 532
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Book Description
This textbook details basic principles of planetary science that help to unify the study of the solar system. It is organized in a hierarchical manner so that every chapter builds upon preceding ones. Starting with historical perspectives on space exploration and the development of the scientific method, the book leads the reader through the solar system. Coverage explains that the origin and subsequent evolution of planets and their satellites can be explained by applications of certain basic principles of physics, chemistry, and celestial mechanics and that surface features of the solid bodies can be interpreted by principles of geology.
Author: James Powell
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416576789
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 280
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Book Description
In Mysteries of Terra Firma, James Lawrence Powell tells an engrossing three-part tale of how we came to understand the ground on which we walk, and how that ground holds the key to the greatest secrets of deep space and time. Naming his profound stories Time, Drift, and Chance, he tells of the three twentieth-century revolutions in thought that created the amazing science of Earth -- and of all planets to the edge of the universe. The riddle that drove the first revolution is obvious and yet in 1904 remained impenetrable: how old is Earth? An encounter between the imperious Lord Kelvin and a New Zealand farm-boy-turned-physicist, Ernest Rutherford, set the stage for the solution and launched a golden century of geology. As a result, scientists learned that if the 4.5 billion years of geologic time were compressed into a single twenty-four-hour period, Homo sapiens would have arrived only in the last second. The geological Revolution of Time reveals how long the ground on which we walk has existed, and how briefly we have trod that ground. In the early twentieth century, German meteorologist and polar explorer Alfred Wegener proposed a counterintuitive, heretical theory: that terra firma is not so firm; instead of being fixed in place, continents drift. In 1926, petroleum geologists convened in New York City to discuss Wegener's radical idea, where it was met with outrage and skepticism: "If we are to believe Wegener's hypothesis we must forget everything which has been learned in the last seventy years and start all over again," one attendee said. Forty years later, a new generation did exactly that. The Revolution of Drift, the second part of Powell's narrative, showed us how the ground on which we walk moves. Throughout geologic time, meteorites have incessantly bombarded everything in the solar system. Far from serene and predictable, the planets are ruled by random violence on an unimaginable scale. Once a mountain-sized meteorite flew through space, struck the Earth, killed the dinosaurs and two-thirds of all species, and spared the small hamster-sized creature that happened to be our ancestor. The chance of that happening again is essentially zero. So, the final revolution in Powell's history of a golden century of geology is the Revolution of Chance. Simply put, this revolution in thought has transformed our understanding of how lucky we really are. If we can learn so much from considering no more than the rocks beneath our feet, what will we learn when we begin walking on other planets? Mysteries of Terra Firma is both charming in its storytelling and staggering in its implications. Discovering the ground on which we stand is a fascinating journey into our past -- and our future.
Author: Peter T. Wlasuk
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1447104838
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 189
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Book Description
Why write another guide to observing the Moon? That was the question I was pondering as I began this project, having a fine collection of "classic" lunar guidebooks dating back to 1791 in my own library. As a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS), member of the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences (AAS DPS), and member of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), I am fortunate to know many pro fessionallunar scientists who keep me up to date with developments in lunar scienc- contrary to public perception, lunar science has definitely not stagnated since the last Apollo, No. 17, left the surface of the Moon in December, 1972. I am also lucky to know many amateur lunar observers, who, like me, enjoy actually looking at the Moon with tele scopes and imaging it with a wide variety of devices ranging from regular 35 mm cameras to video recorders and CCD cameras. My friends who study the Moon, whether in their professions or just for fun, gave me several reasons for doing "another" lunar guidebook. First, the last lunar observer's guide of any length was published over ten years ago, and many reviewers noted that it was badly out of date even then.
Author: Harold R. Thompson
Publisher: Zumaya Otherworlds
ISBN: 1612714455
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 223
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Book Description
They are the last survivors of the settlers of the moon Sturnus, forty children rescued by the benevolent people of the planet Janus. Except Bear is starting to remember, and what he remembers is nothing like what he and the others have been told. Then, from nowhere, a glowing girl appears only he can see; and Bear begins to discover he has very special abilities. So, what really did happen to the people of Sturnus, and what is Bear supposed to do when the people he’s told are his rescuers may in fact be the people who destroyed his world? Ender’s Game meets the Singularity in an exciting story of self-discovery and courage. “Thompson’s compelling SF tale follows Bear’s harrowing quest to find the truth about what really happened in Sturnus…Thoughtful and engaging science fiction.” — Kirkus Reviews
