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Library | Item Barcode | Call Number | Material Type | Item Category 1 | Status |
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Searching... | 30000010124778 | QB501 E52 2007 | Reference Book | Encyclopedia | Searching... |
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Summary
Summary
Long before Galileo published his discoveries about Jupiter, lunar craters, and the Milky Way in the Starry Messenger in 1610, people were fascinated with the planets and stars around them. That interest continues today, and scientists are making new discoveries at an astounding rate. Ancient lake beds on Mars, robotic spacecraft missions, and new definitions of planets now dominate the news. How can you take it all in? Start with the new Encyclopedia of the Solar System, Second Edition .This self-contained reference follows the trail blazed by the bestselling first edition. It provides a framework for understanding the origin and evolution of the solar system, historical discoveries, and details about planetary bodies and how they interact--and has jumped light years ahead in terms of new information and visual impact. Offering more than 50% new material, the Encyclopedia includes the latest explorations and observations, hundreds of new color digital images and illustrations, and more than 1,000 pages. It stands alone as the definitive work in this field, and will serve as a modern messenger of scientific discovery and provide a look into the future of our solar system.
Author Notes
Lucy McFadden is a planetary scientist at the University of Maryland. She was the founding director of the College Park Scholars Program, Science, Discovery and the Universe. She has published over 75 articles in refereed journals and has been co-investigator on NASA's NEAR, Deep Impact and Dawn missions exploring asteroids and comets. She has served on committees on solar system exploration for the National Academy of Sciences, and on the editorial board of Icarus.
Torrence V. Johnson is a specialist on icy satellites in the solar system. He has written over 130 publications for scientific journals. He received a Ph.D. in planetary science from the California Institute of Technology and is now the Chief Scientist for Solar System Exploration at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He was the Project Scientist for the Galileo mission and is currently an investigator on the Cassini mission. He is the recipient of two NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medals and the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal and has an honorary doctorate from the University of Padua, where Galileo made his first observations of the solar system.
Paul R. Weissman is a Senior Research Scientist at JPL, specializing in comets. He is the author of over 100 scientific papers and 30 popular articles. He is also the co-author, with Alan Harris, of a children's book on the Voyager mission. Dr. Weissman received his doctorate in planetary and space physics from the University of California, Los Angeles. His work includes both theoretical and observational studies of comets, investigating their orbital motion, their physical make-up, and the threat they pose due to possible impacts on the Earth. Dr. Weissman is an Interdisciplinary Scientist on ESA's Rosetta mission to comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko.
Reviews 1
Choice Review
Updated from the first edition (CH, Feb'99, 36-3095), this encyclopedia includes major revisions to nearly every chapter, along with completely new chapters, all taking into account events and advances in knowledge that have occurred in the new millennium: an international fleet of spacecraft in place around Mars; Galileo's fiery crash into Jupiter's atmosphere; comet missions Deep Impact and Stardust; Cassini's exploration of the Saturn system; exploration of near-Earth asteroids Eros and Itokawa; and more. Improved capabilities of telescopes and instruments, along with laboratory studies and advances in theory, enable scientists to better synthesize and understand the enormous amounts of new data. This comprehensive volume covers the solar system in great depth. Essays by contributing experts begin with the origins of the solar system and the history of solar system studies; they include chapters on planets and their moons, comets, and other solar system phenomena. Unlike the first edition, each chapter does not have its own glossary; a comprehensive glossary appears at the back of the book, along with an extensive index. Chapters still feature brief bibliographies. The work is well illustrated with both black-and-white and color plates. Here is 50 years' worth of planetary exploration, well written and well organized. This excellent encyclopedia belongs in every collection serving undergraduate and graduate programs in astronomy and geology. Summing Up: Essential. Lower-level undergraduates through graduate students. D. M. Dayton Jaffrey Grade School, Jaffrey, New Hampshire
Table of Contents
Contributors | p. ix |
About the Editors | p. xiii |
Foreword | p. xv |
Preface to the Second Edition | p. xvii |
Preface to the First Edition | p. xix |
Chapter 1 The Solar System and its Place in the Galaxy | p. 1 |
Chapter 2 The Origin of the Solar System | p. 29 |
Chapter 3 A History of Solar System Studies | p. 53 |
Chapter 4 The Sun | p. 71 |
Chapter 5 The Solar Wind | p. 99 |
Chapter 6 Mercury | p. 117 |
Chapter 7 Venus: Atmosphere | p. 139 |
Chapter 8 Venus: Surface and Interior | p. 149 |
Chapter 9 Earth as a Planet: Atmosphere and Oceans | p. 169 |
Chapter 10 Earth as a Planet: Surface and Interior | p. 189 |
Chapter 11 The Sun-Earth Connection | p. 213 |
Chapter 12 The Moon | p. 227 |
Chapter 13 Meteorites | p. 251 |
Chapter 14 Near-Earth Objects | p. 283 |
Chapter 15 Mars Atmosphere: History and Surface Interactions | p. 301 |
Chapter 16 Mars: Surface and Interior | p. 315 |
Chapter 17 Mars: Landing Site Geology, Mineralogy, and Geochemistry | p. 331 |
Chapter 18 Main-Belt Asteroids | p. 349 |
Chapter 19 Planetary Satellites | p. 365 |
Chapter 20 Atmospheres of the Giant Planets | p. 383 |
Chapter 21 Interiors of the Giant Planets | p. 403 |
Chapter 22 Io: The Volcanic Moon | p. 419 |
Chapter 23 Europa | p. 431 |
Chapter 24 Ganymede and Callisto | p. 449 |
Chapter 25 Titan | p. 467 |
Chapter 26 Triton | p. 483 |
Chapter 27 Planetary Rings | p. 503 |
Chapter 28 Planetary Magnetospheres | p. 519 |
Chapter 29 Pluto | p. 541 |
Chapter 30 Physics and Chemistry of Comets | p. 557 |
Chapter 31 Comet Populations and Cometary Dynamics | p. 575 |
Chapter 32 Kuiper Belt: Dynamics | p. 589 |
Chapter 33 Kuiper Belt Objects: Physical Studies | p. 605 |
Chapter 34 Solar System Dust | p. 621 |
Chapter 35 X-Rays in the Solar System | p. 637 |
Chapter 36 The Solar System at Ultraviolet Wavelengths | p. 659 |
Chapter 37 Infrared Views of the Solar System from Space | p. 681 |
Chapter 38 The Solar System at Radio Wavelengths | p. 695 |
Chapter 39 New Generation Ground-Based Optical/Infrared Telescopes | p. 719 |
Chapter 40 Planetary Radar | p. 735 |
Chapter 41 Remote Chemical Sensing Using Nuclear Spectroscopy | p. 765 |
Chapter 42 Solar System Dynamics: Regular and Chaotic Motion | p. 787 |
Chapter 43 Planetary Impacts | p. 813 |
Chapter 44 Planetary Volcanism | p. 829 |
Chapter 45 Astrobiology | p. 849 |
Chapter 46 Planetary Exploration Missions | p. 869 |
Chapter 47 Extrasolar Planets | p. 887 |
Appendix | p. 903 |
Glossary | p. 919 |
Index | p. 939 |