Cosmic Catastrophes: Exploding Stars, Black Holes, and Mapping the Universe [Hardcover]

J. Craig Wheeler (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521857147 | ISBN-13: 978-0521857147 | Publication Date: January 22, 2007 | Edition: 2

From supernovae and gamma-ray bursts to the accelerating Universe, this is an exploration of the intellectual threads that lead to some of the most exciting ideas in modern astrophysics and cosmology. This fully updated second edition incorporates new material on binary stars, black holes, gamma-ray bursts, worm-holes, quantum gravity and string theory. It covers the origins of stars and their evolution, the mechanisms responsible for supernovae, and their progeny, neutron stars and black holes. It examines the theoretical ideas behind black holes and their manifestation in observational astronomy and presents neutron stars in all their variety known today. This book also covers the physics of the twentieth century, discussing quantum theory and Einstein's gravity, how these two theories collide, and the prospects for their reconciliation in the twenty-first century. This will be essential reading for undergraduate students in astronomy and astrophysics, and an excellent, accessible introduction for a wider audience.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Supernovae occur when a star blows up: in its death throes, a star gone supernova "becomes as bright as an entire galaxy." University of Texas astrophysicist Wheeler is one of the world's experts on such stellar explosions and the forces behind them. This accessible, painstaking work of astronomical exposition brings to a general readership Wheeler's knowledge of stars, supernovae and their cousins. The first chapter covers the life cycles of "ordinary" single stars, which coalesce, burn, turn yellow, then red, then dark. Wheeler then gets to the weird stuffAto binary stars, which orbit each other in pairs, and to white dwarves, accretion disks, pulsars and the density of the universe. From models of supernovae, the volume proceeds to specific observed explosions, especially to SN 1987A, which emerged from the Large Magellanic Cloud in February of that year and brought with it experimental confirmation of all sorts of theories. The most famous end-stage product of a star's demise is the black hole, a locus of gravity so dense nothing that goes in can ever come out. Wheeler moves from black holes into space-time and gee-whiz cosmology and to supernova-related theories about the universe's expansion; these issues have been set forth in a glut of popular books, and though Wheeler's exegeses are useful and clear, it's the star-level science here that really shines. This book evolved from a longstanding and popular course taught by Wheeler: its careful explication and organization, designed to attract readers with no knowledge of physics, are welcome by-products of its collegiate origin. 33 halftones and 15 line drawings. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Scientific American

For 25 years, Wheeler, a professor of astronomy at the University of Texas at Austin, has taught a course called Astronomy Bizarre. Its aim is "to introduce some of the exotica of astronomy for which one has little time in the standard introductory course for nonscience majors." Exotica, indeed, populate this book that derives from the course. Accretion disks, supernovae, neutron stars, black holes and gamma-ray bursts march through, all presented with a clarity that doubtless comes from Wheeler's long experience in teaching astrophysics to "bright, interested, but nontechnically trained students." And then he gets to what might be called superexotica: wormholes, time machines, quantum gravity and string theory. It is heady stuff, as he says. So is what he calls "the deepest issue that drives both physicists and theologians." It is, "Why are we here?"

EDITORS OF SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 356 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 2 edition (January 22, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521857147
• ISBN-13: 978-0521857147
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #158,898 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The biggest explosions, October 6, 2000

By 

Duwayne Anderson (Saint Helens, Oregon) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cosmic Catastrophes: Supernovae, Gamma-ray Bursts, and Adventures in Hyperspace (Hardcover)

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 better job than most at helping the reader understand what the diagrams illustrate. More importantly, he helps the reader understand what the diagrams do not illustrate, and their limitations (he dispels some common misperceptions about these sorts of figures). I especially enjoyed Wheeler's explanations about how one might (with the application of the appropriate mental acrobatics) use the diagrams to actually envision what is really going on in our multi-dimensional world.

Another thing I liked about Wheeler's book is the clear and frequent illustrations. For the most part the author has anticipated those places where prose just cannot quite complete the mental picture. When this happens there is inevitably a well-constructed diagram that finishes the concept and makes things clear. There was one exception, however. Figure 7.3 really needs to have an arrow or circle marking the location of SN 1987A. [I'm pretty sure I found it, but the exposure changes between the photographs, and so I'm not quite sure. It would have been nice to have the author's help in preventing a false identification.]

Reading this book one gets the sense that even though it is a qualitative description of astronomy (there are no equations) Wheeler is not over simplifying. His discussion of super novae, for example, lists many classes and describes theoretical uncertainties that other authors gloss over or ignore all together. Of course there is much more detail to super novae than what is in Wheeler's book. But at the qualitative level Wheeler leaves the reader understanding that there are many classifications of super novae, that some of the boundaries between classifications are not always so clear cut, and that we still don't know a lot about how some types form, and how other types explode. These are concepts that other popular science textbooks don't always convey. I think the only thing missing from the chapters on super novae is a table that summarizes all the different types and some of their descriptive identifiers.

Unlike some popular science texts, Wheeler devotes quite a bit of time describing the evolution of binary stars, which play an important role in some of the greatest cosmic catastrophes. I think he does an especially good job of qualitatively describing accretion disks, and how they fit in the context of mass transfer in binary systems. It's this mass transfer that is ultimately involved in some of the most spectacular catastrophes in the sky.

Overall, this is a great book. If you enjoy astronomy I'm sure you will find it satisfying and informative. It's just the sort of book to enjoy on a vacation, or after a grueling day at the office.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How stars work, February 25, 2001

By 

John Dolan (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cosmic Catastrophes: Supernovae, Gamma-ray Bursts, and Adventures in Hyperspace (Hardcover)

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.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clear, clean and concise, August 10, 2010

By 

Unix Engineer - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cosmic Catastrophes: Exploding Stars, Black Holes, and Mapping the Universe (Hardcover)

If you enjoy reading topics in astronomy and in particular stellar evolution, you will enjoy this book. I had gone to the library to pick up something else, saw this book there, and read it first. This is a straight forward factual discussion of "Cosmic Catastrophes" and other topics in astrophysics. Wheeler provides explanations of certain stellar events, some in a way I have not heard before, and were quite enlightening for me. An example is type 1b and 1c supernova. He leaves out all the dribble we have been treated to by some other recent authors and sticks to the state of the knowledge without pandering to the reader. For example, when dealing with worm holes he states, "The balloon serves as a two-dimensional analog of our three-dimensional space...", and using your two fingers to simulate a worm hole, "You would have to cut the rubber and attach the ends of the two cones; but cutting the rubber is the analog of cutting the very fabric of space...". So many other writers have written entire books on the subject carefully ignoring this and a plethoria of issues because it makes for more popular reading. For dark energy he does not forget to let the reader know, "... dark energy is neither predicted nor described by current theories of physics. Understanding dark energy is one of the great challenges to modern physics." I appreciated the concise factual treatment of these and other subjects. I highly recommend this book, and even though I have already read it, will probably buy a copy for my own bookshelf.