Books - (subject:pulsars)and(subject:science)

Product Description:
This book serves as a good introduction to the physics of pulsars by explaining the subject matter in simple terms which are understandable to both undergraduate physics students and also the general public. "On the Pulsar" links together ideas about physics, informatics and biology, and contains many original examples, problems and solutions. It starts with simple examples about the regular structures that are possible in strong magnetic fields and the author then suggests that special conditions on the pulsar can result in some forms of self-organization. It will also make a valuable teaching guide.

Product Description:

Pulsars are rapidly spinning neutron stars, the collapsed cores of once massive stars that ended their lives as supernova explosions. Pulsar rotation rates can reach incredible speeds, up to hundreds of times per second. The story of how an object ‘spins up’ to a significant fraction of the speed of light is fascinating and involves collapsing stellar cores following supernova explosions, while the faster ones result from stellar cannibalism.

In this book, Geoff McNamara explores the history, subsequent discovery and contemporary research into pulsar astronomy. The story of pulsars is brought right up to date with the announcement in 2006 of a new breed of pulsar, Rotating Radio Transients (RRATs), which emit short bursts of radio signals separated by long pauses. These may outnumber conventional radio pulsars by a ratio of four to one. Geoff McNamara ends by pointing out that, despite the enormous success of pulsar research in the second half of the twentieth century, the real discoveries are yet to be made including, perhaps, the detection of the hypothetical pulsar black hole binary system by the proposed Square Kilometre Array - the largest single radio telescope in the world.

Customer Review: Good Entry Level Science:
This is a good book for those who have an interest in this particular stellar pathology also if you enjoy the type of writer who informs via the anecdote you will again find this an entertaining way to learn. He for example explains through the words of Ms Jocelyn Bell her perspective on not being included in the Nobel Prize for the discovery of the pulsar and from my own point of veiw I was interested to learn of the radio interferometry experiments carried out here in post war Sydney. The book begins with the life cycles of stars that eventually become the subject of this book and then leads in to the link between the subatomic and the nature of the neuton star. I felt this section was a little confused but encourage the prospective reader to 'read on'. A few of the diagrams are misplaced and in one case i can recall, insufficient in regard to explanations. Closing chapters explore the subclasses of the Pulsar as well as the system PSR 1913+16 which became famous through it being a test bed for General Relativity and the subject of another book by McNamara, gravitational waves.
This book I hope will inspire readers to look further into the types and classifications of stars as well as the interesting behaviour that they exhibit.
McNamara's book is thouroughly researched and therefore a reliable book, which is not always the case with popular science.

Product Description:

Product Description:
The discovery 25 years ago of the remarkable astronomical objects known as pulsars--and their identification as neutron stars--fulfilled a prediction made more than 30 years earlier. Over 550 pulsars are now known, almost all detected at radio frequencies which capture their distinctive bursts of electromagnetic energy. These pulse periods range from 1.5 milliseconds to several seconds. Most pulsars are single neutron stars but they can also exist in a binary orbit with a companion. Observations have revealed a wealth of detail about the structure and evolution of pulsars and the pulse-emission process, giving new insight into the behavior of matter in the presence of extreme gravitational and electromagnetic fields. In fact, pulsars have unique physical properties which make them nearly ideal as probes for a wide range of physical studies. This volume gathers together up-to-date findings in this area, representing a valuable resource for theoretical and particle physicists as well astrophysicists and astronomers. The contributors are recognized experts in the field, and include such well-known authorities as Joe Taylor who describes his Nobel-Prize winning work (Physics 1993).

Customer Review: A riveting journey:
Although Greenstein's book is somewhat ancient, it remains the most exhilarating exploration of black holes, quasars, pulsars and other phenomena I've ever read. If you want an easily digestible introduction to some of the most fascinating aspects of our universe, you cannot do better than to read Frozen Star.

Customer Review: Excelent source of understanding:
This book truly explains many physical concepts of the mysteries of our universe. It goes in depth explaining in detail pulsars, black holes, and starts, but brings these concepts to an understandable level. The examples presented give a full conceptual understanding of our universe. One can picture what is happening in a black hole through labeled drawings rather than complicated mathematical formulas. This book did a great job of explaining all the aspects of space-time geometery for which I was looking.

Product Description:
Radio pulsars are rapidly rotating, highly magnetized neutron stars. This comprehensive book brings together key observational techniques, background information and a review of the latest results, including the recent discovery of a double pulsar system. Useful software tools are provided to analyze example data, made available on a related website. The work will be of great value to graduate students and researchers wishing to carry out and interpret a wide variety of radio pulsar observations.



Customer Review: tight integration of book and website:
The coolest aspect of the book is its tight integration with the associated website that has scads of observational data. Along with various software that lets you analyse the data for yourself. Any of you in research who've had to write software should appreciate the amount of effort that has gone into the coding of that software.

The book also provides you with a very recent (2004) assessment of the best current understanding of pulsars. With many references to the original research papers.

But the combination of text and website is a harbinger of future astronomy books, as volumes of data keep increasing. Traditional texts gave you no such access.

Product Description:
Since their discovery in 1967, pulsars have assumed a central role in astronomy and astrophysics, offering an opportunity to explore theoretical physics under extreme conditions. Pulsar Astronomy provides an ideal introductory account for those entering the field, and an invaluable reference for established researchers. Now thoroughly revised for its third edition, it covers research over wavelengths ranging from radio through optical and x-ray to gamma-rays. Topics range from the physics of neutron star interiors to the astrophysics of binary stars and the recent tests of general relativity. It is supported by extensive references and a complete catalogue of all known pulsars.



Customer Review: The discoveries over the past forty years.:
The discovery of pulsars is now less than 40 years old. But in that time pulsars have been in the forefront of the discoveries in cosmology. An astounding amount of information exploring the limits of theoretical physics has been obtained from these pulsating light signals.

This book, now in its third edition, would be of interest to the advanced undergraduate astronomy or astrophysics student. Or more likely it can serve as an introductory text to pulsars at the graduate school level or as a source of reference to the researcher. Among other things, it gives a catalog of the 1483 known pulsars.

The text begins with the early history of the discovery of pulsars by Jocelyn Bell during her graduate work at Cambridge (for which her advisor Anthony Hewish received the Nobel prize). From here the book chronicles the discoveries made by other researchers made since that time along with the changes in the theory that these discoveries brought about.

Customer Review: what is currently known about pulsars:
Pulsars are one of the most fascinating types of astronomical objects known. This new third edition gives a comprehensive and up to date description of what is known about them.

Much of the book is the same as earlier editions. Like the now familiar story of how the first pulsar was discovered in the 60s by Jocelyn Bell. And how a Nobel was later awarded to her advisor. (Considered by some to be a massive oversight.)

The book explains how pulsars let us probe cosmological distances and times. (The two are related.) It gives the latest models for pulsar formation. More recent results include the solving of the gamma ray bursters conundrum. A deep puzzle until recently, when satellite observations proved vital in explaining bursters.

Customer Review: interested in astronomy or neutron stars?:
an excellent book for anyone deeply into astronomy, stellar evolution, or galactic dynamics .. the only part i question is the speculation on internal structure. the book should also appeal to physicists interested in materials or states of matter. ah yes! there is much current research in 'gravity waves' (search on LIGO). good luck! :)

Customer Review: A must have for people interested in pulsars:
This book contains everything you need to know about pulsars. Although it includes some advanced physical and mathematical concepts, people not familiar with them can still read and enjoy it. It is an excellent reference for basic information about the discovery, observations and nature of pulsars.

Product Description:

Neutron stars are the most compact astronomical objects in the universe which are accessible by direct observation. Studying neutron stars means studying physics in regimes unattainable in any terrestrial laboratory.

Understanding their observed complex phenomena requires a wide range of scientific disciplines, including the nuclear and condensed matter physics of very dense matter in neutron star interiors, plasma physics and quantum electrodynamics of magnetospheres, and the relativistic magneto-hydrodynamics of electron-positron pulsar winds interacting with some ambient medium. Not to mention the test bed neutron stars provide for general relativity theories, and their importance as potential sources of gravitational waves. It is this variety of disciplines which, among others, makes neutron star research so fascinating, not only for those who have been working in the field for many years but also for students and young scientists.

The aim of this book is to serve as a reference work which not only reviews the progress made since the early days of pulsar astronomy, but especially focuses on questions such as: "What have we learned about the subject and how did we learn it?", "What are the most important open questions in this area?" and "What new tools, telescopes, observations, and calculations are needed to answer these questions?".

All authors who have contributed to this book have devoted a significant part of their scientific careers to exploring the nature of neutron stars and understanding pulsars. Everyone has paid special attention to writing educational comprehensive review articles with the needs of beginners, students and young scientists as potential readers in mind. This book will be a valuable source of information for these groups.

Product Description:
This book is an introduction to pulsars, a key area in high energy astrophysics with continuing potential for fundamental discoveries. Throughout the book runs the unifying thread of the evolutionary link between rotation-powered pulsars and accretion-powered pulsars a milestone of modern astrophysics. Early textbooks on pulsars dealt almost entirely with rotation-powered ones, while accounts of pulsars in volumes on X-ray binaries focused almost exclusively on accretion-powered ones. This is the first textbook to treat these two kinds of pulsars simultaneously with equal importance, stressing the fact that both are rotating, magnetic neutron stars, operating under different conditions during different parts of their lives. It describes the observational properties of both kinds of pulsars, summarizes our physical understanding of these properties, and pays detailed attention to the physics of superdense matter which neutron stars are composed of, as well as to the superfluidity which is expected to occur in neutron stars. Evolution from rotation-power to accretion-power, and vice versa, are carefully described. The effects of the strong magnetic fields of neutron stars on themselves, their emission properties, and their environments are discussed, as are the origin and evolution of such magnetic fields. Also treated is the superbly accurate verification of Einstein's theory of general relativity through timing studies of binary pulsars, which led to the award of the Nobel Prize to Hulse and Taylor in 1993. On each topic, the book starts with simple, basic physical concepts, and builds up the exposition to the point where the latest and most exciting developments become accessible to the reader.