Every massive star leaves behind a black hole when it dies, and every galaxy harbors a supermassive black hole at its center. Frighteningly enigmatic, these dark giants continue to astound even the scientists who spend their careers studying them. Which came first, the galaxy or its central black hole? What happens if you travel into one—instant death or something weirder? And, perhaps most important, how can we ever know anything for sure about black holes when they destroy information by their very nature?In Einstein’s Monsters, distinguished astronomer Chris Impey takes readers on an exploration of these and other questions at the cutting edge of astrophysics, as well as the history of black holes’ role in theoretical physics—from confirming Einstein’s equations for general relativity to testing string theory. He blends this history with a poignant account of the phenomena scientists have witnessed while observing black holes: stars swarming like bees around the center of our galaxy; black holes performing gravitational waltzes with visible stars; the cymbal clash of two black holes colliding, releasing ripples in space-time.Clear, compelling, and profound, Einstein’s Monsters reveals how our comprehension of black holes is intrinsically linked to how we make sense of the universe and our place within it. From the small questions to the big ones—from the tiniest particles to the nature of space-time itself—black holes might be the key to a deeper understanding of the cosmos.

    The bulk of the Navy that once conquered the stars in mothballs, only a handful of obsolete cruisers patrolling the far frontiers of space. When a genocidal alien race decides that humanity is its next target for extermination, only a single ship can stand against them, a battered old cruiser named Leonidas, and her maverick commander, Mike Scott, brought out of enforced retirement to lead his ship and his crew one last time. As the worlds of mankind burn under the wrath of the enemy, Captain Scott must fight one desperate battle after another to buy time for the Commonwealth to must its battlefleet, or face the destruction of Earth, and all humanity with it…

    The only question is when. In the meantime, we need to get much better at finding objects hurtling our way, and if they’re large enough to penetrate the atmosphere without burning up, figure out what to do about them. We owe many of science’s most important discoveries to the famed Meteor Crater, a mile-wide dimple on the Colorado Plateau created by an asteroid hit 50,000 years ago. In his masterfully researched Fire in the Sky, Dillow unpacks what the Crater has to tell us. Prior to the early 1900s, the world believed that all craters—on the Earth and Moon—were formed by volcanic activity. Not so. The revelation that Meteor Crater and others like it were formed by impacts with space objects has led to a now accepted theory about what killed off the dinosaurs, and it has opened up a new field of asteroid observation, which has recently brimmed with urgency. Dillow looks at great asteroid hits of the past and spends time with modern-day asteroid hunters and defense planning experts, including America’s first Planetary Defense Officer. Satellite sensors confirm that a Hiroshima-scale blast occurs in the atmosphere every year, and a smaller, one-kiloton blast every month. While Dillow makes clear that the objects above can be deadly, he consistently inspires awe with his descriptions of their size, makeup, and origins. At once a riveting work of popular science and a warning to not take for granted the space objects hurtling overhead, Fire in the Sky is, above all, a testament to our universe’s celestial wonders.

    Yet most of us look up at the night sky and feel totally in the dark when it comes to the basic facts about the universe.Kenneth C. Davis steps into that void with a lively and readable guide to the discoveries, theories, and real people who have shed light on the mysteries and wonders of the cosmos. Discover why Einstein was such a genius, the truth behind a blue moon or two, the amazing secrets of Stonehenge, and even how one great astronomer lost his nose.With the fun question-and-answer format that has appealed to the millions of readers of his bestselling Don't Much About® series, you'll be taking off on an exciting armchair exploration of the solar system, the Milky Way, and beyond.

      In the past few years, a handful of scientists have been in a race to explain a disturbing aspect of our universe: only 4 percent of it consists of the matter that makes up you, me, our books, and every planet, star, and galaxy. The rest—96 percent of the universe—is completely unknown.   Richard Panek tells the dramatic story of how scientists reached this conclusion, and what they’re doing to find this "dark" matter and an even more bizarre substance called dark energy. Based on in-depth, on-site reporting and hundreds of interviews—with everyone from Berkeley’s feisty Saul Perlmutter and Johns Hopkins’s meticulous Adam Riess to the quietly revolutionary Vera Rubin—the book offers an intimate portrait of the bitter rivalries and fruitful collaborations, the eureka moments and blind alleys, that have fueled their search, redefined science, and reinvented the universe.

    Yet they remain among the most mysterious of concepts. Is space an entity? Why does time have a direction? Could the universe exist without space and time? Can we travel to the past? Greene has set himself a daunting task: to explain non-intuitive, mathematical concepts like String Theory, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, and Inflationary Cosmology with analogies drawn from common experience. From Newton’s unchanging realm in which space and time are absolute, to Einstein’s fluid conception of spacetime, to quantum mechanics’ entangled arena where vastly distant objects can instantaneously coordinate their behavior, Greene takes us all, regardless of our scientific backgrounds, on an irresistible and revelatory journey to the new layers of reality that modern physics has discovered lying just beneath the surface of our everyday world.

    Now in paperback, The Neptune File is the first account of the dramatic events surrounding the discovery of the solar system's eighth planet, and the story of two men who were able to see on paper what astronomers looking through telescopes for 200 years did not.

    You'll learn how to overcome the unique issues that confront nighttime photographers and capture images of which you'll be proud. Co-author Jennifer Wu, an elite Canon "Explorer of Light" professional photographer, has become renowned for her ability to capture nighttime phenomena, from quarter-phase moon rises to shooting stars to the ephemeral Milky Way. this new guide reveals her methods and concentrates on photographing four principal subjects: stars as points of light, star trails, the moon, and twilight. these subjects share common photo techniques and considerations, but each also requires a distinct approach. Once captured, your digital images must be fi nished on the computer; coauthor and author of the bestselling Photography: Outdoors, James Martin, delves into the settings and procedures that elevate an image from mundane to striking. This clear and practical guide will help photographers of all levels portray the stunning spectacle of the night sky, preserving those special memories and moments from a life outdoors.

    This stirring book reveals how scientific discovery has altered our perception of who we are and where we stand, and challenges us to weigh what we will do with that knowledge. Photos, many in color.

    Featuring fascinating insights into our scientific future born from the author’s provocative conversations with Nate Silver, David Chang, and Scott Derrickson, Knocking on Heaven’s Door is eminently readable, one of the most important popular science books of this or any year. It is a necessary volume for all who admire the work of Stephen Hawking, Michio Kaku, Brian Greene, Simon Singh, and Carl Sagan; for anyone curious about the workings and aims of the Large Hadron Collider, the biggest and most expensive machine ever built by mankind; for those who firmly believe in the importance of science and rational thought; and for anyone interested in how the Universe began…and how it might ultimately end.

    One sought to discover a new planet. Another—an adventuresome female astronomer—fought to prove that science was not anathema to femininity. And a young, megalomaniacal inventor, with the tabloid press fast on his heels, sought to test his scientific bona fides and light the world through his revelations. David Baron brings to three-dimensional life these three competitors—James Craig Watson, Maria Mitchell, and Thomas Edison—and thrillingly re-creates the fierce jockeying of nineteenth-century American astronomy. With spellbinding accounts of train robberies and Indian skirmishes, the mythologized age of the last days of the Wild West comes alive as never before. A magnificent portrayal of America’s dawn as a scientific superpower, American Eclipse depicts a young nation that looked to the skies to reveal its towering ambition and expose its latent genius.

    The fantastic journey began in 1977, before the first episode of Cosmos aired. The mission was planned as a grand tour beyond the moon; beyond Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; and maybe even into interstellar space. The fact that it actually happened makes this humanity's greatest space mission.In The Interstellar Age, award-winning planetary scientist Jim Bell reveals what drove and continues to drive the members of this extraordinary team, including Ed Stone, Voyager's chief scientist and the one-time head of NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab; Charley Kohlhase, an orbital dynamics engineer who helped to design many of the critical slingshot maneuvers around planets that enabled the Voyagers to travel so far; and the geologist whose Earth-bound experience would prove of little help in interpreting the strange new landscapes revealed in the Voyagers' astoundingly clear images of moons and planets.Speeding through space at a mind-bending eleven miles a second, Voyager 1 is now beyond our solar system's planets. It carries with it artifacts of human civilization. By the time Voyager passes its first star in about 40,000 years, the gold record on the spacecraft, containing various music and images including Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode," will still be playable.

    meets Star Wars!Blamed for a theft he didn't commit ...Pursued by some of the most dangerous creatures in the galaxy ... Adam Cain is BACK ... and ready for some royal alien ass-kicking!International bestselling science fiction author T.R. Harris introduces the first book in his new space opera series set in the universe of The Human Chronicles Saga , a thrilling tale of Human Superiority in the galaxy. The Adam Cain Chronicles  Book #1: The Dead WorldsYou've heard of him. He's Adam Cain,  The Alien with an Attitude.  Now he's back... in a series of new adventures as a badass Human showing the galaxy who's the boss. Accompanied by his buddies Riyad Tarazi and Sherri Valentine, Adam is struggling to make ends meet on a distant tropical world running Capt. Cain's Bar & Grill . The problem:They picked the worst place in the galaxy to run a legitimate business ... smack dab in the middle of lawless Dead Zone . Comprised of a hundred dead worlds left in the wake of one of Adam's old enemies--Kracion-- The Zone is a gold-rush-like region of salvagers, pirates and scoundrels,all looking for their piece of the action. And in the center of all this activity is the oasis planet of Liave-3, the home of Capt. Cain's .  In The Dead Worlds: After a supply of prototype superweapons goes missing from one of the dead worlds, suspicion falls on Adam and his friends as the thieves.Our heroes find themselves being hunted, kidnapped and otherwise abused...until they say enough is enough. That's when the aliens learn the galaxy's most important lesson: You don't mess with the Humans !  The Adam Cain Chronicles takes Adam and his friends back their basic raw talents, as supermen among the aliens of the galaxy. Set in the familiar universe of The Human Chronicles Saga , this new series rediscovers the wonder and excitement of the earlier books, when it was just Human vs. Alien. It also retains all the humor, witty banter and gritty realism of the first series. Each novel in The Adam Cain Chronicles is written to be a stand-alone work, able to be read by old and new fans alike. So if you've never experienced an Adam Cain adventures before, this is a great place to start. And for existing fans, you'll find all of the elements you loved in The Human Chronicles Saga ...and more! The ride is about to start! Order your copy of The Dead Worlds today.  Don't miss a minute of The Adam Cain Chronicles . And be sure to check out all the novels by T.R. Harris....The Adam Cain ChroniclesThe Dead Worlds The Human Chronicles SagaThe Fringe Worlds Alien Assassin The War of Pawns

    So it comes as a surprise to Jon to be wished a Merry Christmas on what he otherwise thinks is just another day. As his grip on the day starts to unravel, he's confronted with a crew expecting him to know what is going on. After all, it is his ship, and they think he's the captain, so he must know everything. Jon wishes that were so. As his day lurches from one thing to another, it seems that only Santa knows the whole plan. Join Jon, Jane, and the Alpha team for Christmas day in space. This is a short story, set sometime around the end of Hire a Hero, and the beginning of Hero to the Rescue. The Hunter Legacy series: Part One: 1. Hero at Large 2. Hunted Hero Hunting 3. Send in the Hero 4. Make or Break the Hero 5. Hail the Hero End of Part 1 6. Burnside's Killer (An Interlude Novella between Parts 1 & 2) Part Two: 7. Hire a Hero Jane's Christmas (A short story) 8. Hero to the Rescue ***forthcoming***

    The general theory of relativity describes the behavior of very large things, and quantum theory the behavior of very small things. In this landmark book, John Gribbin—one of the best-known science writers of the past thirty years—presents his own version of the Holy Grail of physics, the search that has been going on for decades to find a unified “Theory of Everything” that combines these ideas into one mathematical package, a single equation that could be printed on a T-shirt, containing the answer to life, the Universe, and everything. With his inimitable mixture of science, history, and biography, Gribbin shows how—despite skepticism among many physicists—these two great theories are very compatible, and point to a deep truth about the nature of our existence. The answer lies, intriguingly, with the age of the universe: 13.8 billion years.