Lars Lindberg Christensen, Robert Fosbury, Robert L. Hurt

Hidden Universe

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Adopting a popular style, this book shows the fundamental change in our perception of the universe by covering the full spectrum of light, emphasizing what humans cannot see. It makes comparisons with high-color images to reveal what is actually going on behind the veil.

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Unsere Augen sind ein Ergebnis der Anpassung an das Sonnenlicht. Die Sonne ist ein Zwergstern, die nur in einem relativ engen Spektralbereich emittiert. Entsprechend wenig sehen wir vom Universum. Wissenschaftlich exakt und trotzdem unterhaltsam zeigen die Autor dieses Bandes auch dem fachlichen Laien, was uns in anderen Bereichen des Spektrums entgeht, von Radiowellen über UV- und Röntgenstrahlung bis zur kosmischen Strahlung. Hervorragende Abbildungen, Infokästen und Diagramme lockern den Text auf und lassen die Fakten anschaulich werden.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Wiley-VCH
• 1. Auflage
• Seitenzahl: 120
• Erscheinungstermin: November 2008
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 304mm x 255mm x 14mm
• Gewicht: 978g
• ISBN-13: 9783527408665
• ISBN-10: 3527408665
• Artikelnr.: 23846534

Autorenporträt

Lars Lindberg Christensen is press officer of the International Astronomical Union, as well as IAU EC International Year of Astronomy 2009 Working Group Secretary. An astronomer by profession, he is a science communication specialist heading the Hubble European Space Agency Information Centre group, responsible for public outreach and education for the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope in Europe.
Robert (Bob) Fosbury is an astronomer working for the European Space Agency (ESA) as part of ESA's collaboration with NASA on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) project at ST-ECF. Bob also served on NASA's Ad Hoc Science Working Group and ESA's Study Science Team as they developed the instrument concepts for the James Webb Space Telescope, the next generation space observatory. Bon and Lars wrote the highly successful "Hubble - 15 Years of Discovery".
Robert Hurt is professional artist, specialized on art in astronomy.

Inhaltsangabe

Foreword

Preface

1. Our limited vision

Our eyes are the result of an evolutionary adaptation to the Sun's light. The Sun is a G dwarf and emits most of its light in only a small part of the electromagnetic spectrum. As a result our eyes are very limited in their capability to really show us the Universe.

- The electromagnetic spectrum
- The creation of light
- Thermal (blackbody): Why are there no green stars? The colour of stars, pastel shades
- Spectral lines (fluorescence): The colours of nebulas, the chemistry and dynamics of the universe
- Non-thermal (synchrotron): Particles spiralling in magnetic fields, neutron stars, cosmic rays
- Hot stuff (blackbodies):
- The rest: Non-thermal. Gravitational energy, accretion disks, black holes, AGN, particles in magnetic fields
- Box: Sources of heat: Fusion, gravitational energy/accretion disks/black holes, explosions/supernovae, spinning magnetic fields/neutron stars
- Box: The colour of the Sun

2. The View from the Ground
- Our limiting atmosphere: limited windows on the sky
- Classic optical telescopes
- Blurring, lack of stability
- Near-infrared observations from the ground: Mauna Kea etc.
- Radio & Microwave telescopes
- Alma
- SKA
- Exotic observatories
- Cosmic ray observatories
- Neutrino observatories
- Box: Detectors on the ground

3. Space observatories - our new eyes on the Universe
- The space age started with Sputnik in 1957
- The Advantages of Space
- Always night
- No interfering atmosphere
- The Challenges of Space
- Automation & Reliability
- Hostile environment: cosmic rays and solar storms
- What's Inside a Space Observatory?
- More than 100 space observatories have been launched into space so far
- The ten most famous space observatories in facts and pictures (one page per observatory).
- What do they observe?
- Box: Detectors in space

4. The Radio Universe
- What emits radio waves?
- The first radio telescopes emerge
- Visible light - radio comparisons
- The Cosmic Microwave Background
- Box: Hydrogen everywhere: The 21 cm line

5. The Infrared Universe
- What is infrared light?
- Sensitive to coolest thermal sources in the universe
- Dust clouds are luminous and transparent; can see where visible light is blocked
- What emits infrared light?
- Sensitive to coolest thermal sources in the universe
- Cool stars
- Dust clouds
- Visible light - infrared light comparisons
- Box: The colour of heat
- Box: Recycling of radiation Shared with 6
- Dust re-emission
- Emission nebulae
- Reflection nebulae
- Fluorescent processes

6. The Visible Universe
- What do we see in visible light?
- Larger, hotter stars
- Hot gas
- What are the real colours of the objects? "Natural color" vs. representative color
- Box: What we learn from the colours: temperature, chemical composition motions etc.
- Box: The colour of the Universe

7. The Ultraviolet Universe
- What do we see in ultraviolet light?
- Star formation and the hottest, youngest stars
- Hotter gas
- The Lyman limit
- Visible light - ultraviolet light comparisons
- Reionization: the clearing of the universe's skies

8. The X-Ray Universe
- What do we see in X-ray light?
- The very hottest things
- Exploding stars & their shock waves
- Colliding galaxies
- Black holes and accretion disks
- Hottest gas
- Visible light - X-ray comparisons

9. The Gamma-ray Universe
- The high-energy universe
- Gamma Ray Bursts
- Visible light - Gamma-ray comparisons

10. The Cosmic ray Universe
- From rotating neutron stars, supernovae, and black holes
- From radio galaxies, colliding galaxies and quasars
- Some cosmic rays have extremely high energies - up to 1020 eV (the "Oh-My-God particle" from 15 Oct 1991 of unknown origin)
- Cosmic rays may have an influence on the climate

11. The Future
- The largest challenges in astronomy: Dark matter, dark energy
- Gravitational wave observations
- Space observatories of the future such as James Webb Space Telescope