Cosmic Catastrophes: Supernovae, Gamma-Ray Bursts, and Adventures in Hyperspace

by J. Craig Wheeler

Book Overview

In this tour-de-force of the ultimate and extreme in astrophysics, renowned astrophysicist and author J. Craig Wheeler takes us on a breathtaking journey to supernovae, black holes, gamma-ray bursts... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521651956
• ISBN13: 9780521651950
• Release Date: July 2000
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

The fate of stars

This is quite an excellent book about stars in general, but it goes into more details concerning the eventual fate of stars, whether it be supernova, neutron stars / pulsars, or black holes. Most of the time, it is easy to read but it is still a notch higher than an introductory textbook, so it better fits the needs of an interested audience, such as amateur astronomers. For example, the author probably assumes you already have a basic understanding before reading the book of the great variety of the nature of light, how it varies from radio waves to infrared, to visible light, to ultraviolet, X-rays and gamma rays, and about the level of energy associated with each wavelength. It is important to understand basic spectroscopy concepts since the chapters about pulsars and gamma-rays revolves a lot around that and there is no real introduction about the nature of light and wavelengths in the book. The best parts are the ones regarding supernova types and their characteristics, and the fascinating part about the features of black holes. The illustrations showing in 2D how these cosmic phenomenons behave are extremely helpful to understand their complex nature. I would put more of those illustrations for the 3rd edition if I would be the author. I would have given it 5 stars, but I felt the last 2 chapters were kind of thrown out in there and did not fit the whole thing. These chapters about wormholes and string theories are interesting but they try to cover too much ground in too few many pages. So I gave it 4 stars. But overall, this is a very good book about the fate of stars and how they end their lives. You will like it.

Excellent book

This book probably has some of the best descriptions for novae and supernovae, that I have seen, for non-scientists.

Cosmic catastrophies by J. Craig Wheeler

Highly recommended for the cosmically curious who does not have the mathmatical background. It is easy to understand and well written.

How stars work

I found this book a complete surprise. From the title, I expected only a story about explosions and collisions but this book is much, much more. It provides really brilliant descriptions of how all kinds of stars evolve and how they regulate their energy production. After reading this book I fully understood why aging stars produce more energy but are cooler than they were in their youth. A minor complaint might be that the content is not well organized. A type 1A supernova is explained here and a type 2 there and later some more about 1A etc. But, I shouldn't dwell on a quibble. This is a terrific book. After reading it I'll never think of iron or nickel in quite the same way again.

The biggest explosions

There seems to be an aspect of human nature that wants to search out and discover things that are the most extreme in their class. People just seem to love record setters. This is a book about cosmic record setters. Within its pages Wheeler describes the biggest, most energetic, oldest, densest, things in the universe. If cosmic record holders hold any interest for you, then I think you'll find this book as enjoyable as I did.Wheeler begins his book by describing how stars form, how they evolve in response to gravity, how they ignite, how they burn, and eventually how they die. This is a logical introduction, since virtually all the examples of cosmic catastrophes involve stars in one form or another. Like people, though, the life of each star is unique - and the end times are very different. Wheeler does an excellent job of describing the negative feedback process that stabilizes solar activity. If the star generates too much heat it expands. This expansion reduces the temperature, and throttles back on the rate of nuclear fusion. If the star cools down it contracts, and the contraction heats it up again, keeping the rate of fusion at a remarkably constant level for long periods of time during the stars life. Much of Wheeler's text is actually about how stars evolve. This is important because to understand their deaths, you need to understand how they are born and how they evolve over their lifetimes. Their deaths are frequently the most interesting parts of the story because they are often involved with the catastrophes that are the book's principal thesis. While I bought the book because of its discussion about cosmic catastrophes, I found it valuable for its descriptions of stellar evolution alone. This includes a nice description of the "solar-neutrino" problem as well as a nice explanation of the red-giant phase, and especially the last stages during the life of a massive star that explodes in a super nova.The foundational understanding of the basics of stellar evolution makes it easier to follower Wheeler as he takes the reader on a tour of the major players in cosmic catastrophes: white dwarfs, super novae (of many different types), neutron stars, black holes, and gamma-ray bursts. Wheeler's descriptions of these phenomena (to the extent that modern science understands them) are among the best I've seen in a popular science textbook. There is also a smattering of discussion about the origin of the universe in the Big Bang, and some interesting speculation about time (and space) travel using black holes. In any book dealing with modern cosmology and astronomy there are inevitable discussions about the nature of space and time and how they fit together with Einstein's theory of general relativity. Most such books have at least one figure showing a funnel-shaped construct with grid lines converging as they swoop into the tapering end where the black hole resides. Wheeler uses lots of such diagrams. However, I think he does a