Neutrino Hunters

Download or read book Neutrino Hunters written by Ray Jayawardhana and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2013-12-10 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The incredibly small bits of matter we call neutrinos may hold the secret to why antimatter is so rare, how mighty stars explode as supernovas and what the universe was like just seconds after the big bang. They even illuminate the inner workings of our own planet. For more than eighty years, adventurous minds from around the world have been chasing these ghostly particles, trillions of which pass through our bodies every second. Extremely elusive and difficult to pin down, neutrinos are not unlike the brilliant and eccentric scientists who doggedly pursue them. Ray Jayawardhana recounts in Neutrino Hunters a captivating saga of scientific discovery and celebrates a glorious human quest, revealing why the next decade of neutrino hunting could redefine how we think about physics, cosmology and our lives on Earth.

Download or read book Neutrino Hunters written by Ray Jayawardhana and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2013-12-10 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the Canadian Science Writers Association Science in Society Book Award One of the Best Physics Books of 2013, Cocktail Party Physics Blog, Scientific American Detective thriller meets astrophysics in this adventure into neutrinos and the scientists who pursue them The incredibly small bits of matter we call neutrinos may hold the secret to why antimatter is so rare, how mighty stars explode as supernovae, what the universe was like just seconds after the big bang, and even the inner workings of our own planet. For more than eighty years, adventurous minds from around the world have been chasing these ghostly particles, trillions of which pass through our bodies every second. Extremely elusive and difficult to pin down, neutrinos are not unlike the brilliant and eccentric scientists who doggedly pursue them. In Neutrino Hunters, the renowned astrophysicist and award-winning writer Ray Jayawardhana takes us on a thrilling journey into the shadowy world of neutrinos and the colorful lives of those who seek them. Demystifying particle science along the way, Jayawardhana tells a detective story with cosmic implications—interweaving tales of the sharp-witted theorist Wolfgang Pauli; the troubled genius Ettore Majorana; the harbinger of the atomic age Enrico Fermi; the notorious Cold War defector Bruno Pontecorvo; and the dynamic dream team of Marie and Pierre Curie. Then there are the scientists of today who have caught the neutrino bug, and whose experimental investigations stretch from a working nickel mine in Ontario to a long tunnel through a mountain in central Italy, from a nuclear waste site in New Mexico to a bay on the South China Sea, and from Olympic-size pools deep underground to a gigantic cube of Antarctic ice—called, naturally, IceCube. As Jayawardhana recounts a captivating saga of scientific discovery and celebrates a glorious human quest, he reveals why the next decade of neutrino hunting will redefine how we think about physics, cosmology, and our lives on Earth.

Download or read book Child of the Universe written by Ray Jayawardhana and published by Make Me a World. This book was released on 2020-03-17 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Perfect for fans of The Wonderful Things You Will Be and That's Me Loving You, this picture book by a renowned astrophysicist is a lyrical meditation on the preciousness of one child and the vastness of the universe. Just like the sun gives shine to the moon, you light up the world beyond this room . . . You are grand and marvelous, strong and mysterious. The history of the world is in your fingertips. A lyrical meditation on the preciousness of one child and the vastness of the universe, this gorgeously illustrated picture book shares the immensity of a parent's love along with the message that we are all connected to the broader cosmos in important and intimate ways. A perfect bedtime read-aloud, Child of the Universe is a book to cherish forever. The author is an astrophysicist who has been fascinated by the universe since he was a child. As a parent, he has developed a new appreciation for the deep connections between billions of years of cosmic evolution and this one tiny human.

Download or read book Strange New Worlds written by Ray Jayawardhana and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-04-21 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describes the science of planet hunters, the prospects for the discovery of alien life, and discusses the controversies surrounding extrasolar-planet research.

Download or read book How to Destroy the Universe written by Paul Parsons and published by Quercus. This book was released on 2013-10-01 with total page 279 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: If you thought physics was all about measuring the temperature of ice in a bucket or trying to fathom what E=mc2 means, think again. How to Destroy the Universe and 34 other really interesting uses of physics demystifies the astonishing world of physics in a series of intriguing, entertaining and often extraordinary scenarios--that explain key physics concepts in plain and simple language. You'll find out how to save the planet from energy shortages by mining the vacuum of empty space, engineer the Earth's climate to reverse the effects of global warming, and fend off killer asteroids just like Bruce Willis and his vest. You'll learn essential survival skills such as how to live through a lightning strike, how to tough it out during an earthquake and how to fall into a black hole without being squashed into spaghetti. And you'll discover some plain old cool stuff like how to turn lead into gold, how to travel to the centre of the Earth, how to crack supposedly unbreakable codes and how to use physics to predict the stock market. So if you want to get to grips with science behind relativity, antigravity and parallel universes, or if you are really more interested in learning how to teleport, travel through time or achieve immortality, this is the perfect introduction to the amazing world of modern physics.

Download or read book The Science of Shakespeare written by Dan Falk and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2014-04-22 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: William Shakespeare lived at a remarkable time—a period we now recognize as the first phase of the Scientific Revolution. New ideas were transforming Western thought, the medieval was giving way to the modern, and the work of a few key figures hinted at the brave new world to come: the methodical and rational Galileo, the skeptical Montaigne, and—as Falk convincingly argues—Shakespeare, who observed human nature just as intently as the astronomers who studied the night sky. In The Science of Shakespeare, we meet a colorful cast of Renaissance thinkers, including Thomas Digges, who published the first English account of the "new astronomy" and lived in the same neighborhood as Shakespeare; Thomas Harriot—"England's Galileo"—who aimed a telescope at the night sky months ahead of his Italian counterpart; and Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, whose observatory-castle stood within sight of Elsinore, chosen by Shakespeare as the setting for Hamlet—and whose family crest happened to include the names "Rosencrans" and "Guildensteren." And then there's Galileo himself: As Falk shows, his telescopic observations may have influenced one of Shakespeare's final works. Dan Falk's The Science of Shakespeare explores the connections between the famous playwright and the beginnings of the Scientific Revolution—and how, together, they changed the world forever.

Download or read book Mathematical Curiosities written by Alfred S. Posamentier and published by Prometheus Books. This book was released on 2014-08-12 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An innovative and appealing way for the layperson to develop math skills--while actually enjoying it Most people agree that math is important, but few would say it's fun. This book will show you that the subject you learned to hate in high school can be as entertaining as a witty remark, as engrossing as the mystery novel you can't put down--in short, fun! As veteran math educators Posamentier and Lehmann demonstrate, when you realize that doing math can be enjoyable, you open a door into a world of unexpected insights while learning an important skill. The authors illustrate the point with many easily understandable examples. One of these is what mathematicians call the "Ruth-Aaron pair" (714 and 715), named after the respective career home runs of Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron. These two consecutive integers contain a host of interesting features, one of which is that their prime factors when added together have the same sum. The authors also explore the unusual aspects of such numbers as 11 and 18, which have intriguing properties usually overlooked by standard math curriculums. And to make you a better all-around problem solver, a variety of problems is presented that appear simple but have surprisingly clever solutions. If math has frustrated you over the years, this delightful approach will teach you many things you thought were beyond your reach, while conveying the key message that math can and should be anything but boring.