On the Moon : The Apollo Journals
This book explains how the Apollo crews learned to work on the lunar surface. Its lively and informative text draws heavily on transcripts and photographs to illustrate points. It puts the reader on the lunar surface with the astronauts, sharing their observations, excitement, and frustrations.
Neutron Stars 1 : Equation of State and Structure
The book gives an extended review of theoretical and observational aspects of neutron star physics. With masses comparable to that of the Sun and radii of about ten kilometres, neutron stars are the densest stars in the Universe. This book describes all layers of neutron stars, from the surface to the core, with the emphasis on their structure and equation of state.
Modeling Solar Radiation at the Earth’s Surface : Recent Advances
Solar radiation data is important for a wide range of applications, e.g. in engineering, agriculture, health sector, and in many fields of the natural sciences. A few examples showing the diversity of applications may include: architecture and building design e.g. air conditioning and cooling systems; solar heating system design and use; solar power generation; weather and climate prediction models; evaporation and irrigation; calculation of water requirements for crops; monitoring plant growth and disease control; skin cancer research.
Ionospheric multi-spacecraft analysis tools : Approaches for deriving ionospheric parameters
This book provides a comprehensive toolbox of analysis techniques for ionospheric multi-satellite missions. The immediate need for this volume was motivated by the ongoing ESA Swarm satellite mission, but the tools that are described are general and can be used for any future ionospheric multi-satellite mission with comparable instrumentation.
Introduction to Planetary Science : The Geological Perspective
This textbook is intended to be used in a lecture course for college students majoring in the Earth Sciences. Planetary Science provides an opportunity for these students to apply a wide range of subject matter pertaining to the Earth to the study of other planets of the solar system and their principal satellites. As a result, students gain a wider perspective of the different worlds that are accessible to us and they are led to recognize the Earth as the only oasis in space where we can live without life-support systems.The subject matter is presented in 24 chapters that lead the reader through the solar system starting with historical perspectives on space exploration and the development of the scientific method. The presentations concerning the planets and their satellites emphasize that their origin and subsequent evolution can be explained by applications of certain basic principles of physics, chemistry, and celestial mechanics and that the surface features of the solid bodies in the solar system can be interpreted by means of the principles of geology.
How Apollo flew to the moon
Out of the technological battlefield of World War II came a team of gifted German engineers and designers who developed the vengeance weapon, the V-2, which evolved into the peaceful, powerful Saturn V rocket to take men to the Moon. David Woods tells the exciting story, starting from America’s post war astronautical research facilities, that used the V-2 for the development of the robust, resilient and reliable Saturn V launcher. He describes the initial launches through manned orbital spaceflights, comprehensively detailing each step, including computer configuration, the role of ground control, trajectory planning, lunar orbiting, separation of the lander, walking and working on the Moon, retrieval of the lunar astronauts and returning to Earth in this massive technical accomplishment.
Handbook of neurochemistry and molecular neurobiology : Neurotransmitter Systems
The brain is the organ that collects information from the environment, processes and stores the information, and generates behavior as and when needed. In essence, the brain makes us who we are. For this reason, understanding the biology of brain function is a great challenge and a major goal of modern science. The brain is one of the last great frontiers in science, and the unraveling of its mysteries is comparable in complexity to efforts in space exploration. A fundamental goal of neuroscience is to understand how neurons generate behavior and the pathophysiology of different mental and neurological diseases. This requires, among other things, information about where these neurons are located, how they are connected, and how they communicate with each other in various physiological and pathophysiological conditions. Our aim is to describe recent discoveries about the basic operations of the brain and to provide an introduction to the adaptations for specific types of information processing.
Future Spacecraft Propulsion Systems : Enabling Technologies for Space Exploration
In Future Spacecraft Propulsion Systems the authors demonstrate the need to break free from the old established concepts of expendable rockets, using chemical propulsion, and to develop new breeds of launch vehicle capable of both launching payloads into orbit at dramatically reduced cost, and for sustained operations in low-Earth orbit. The next steps, they explain, to establishing a permanent "presence" in the solar system beyond Earth are the commercialisation of sustained operations on the Moon, and the development of advanced nuclear or high-energy space propulsion systems for solar system exploration out to the boundary of interstellar space. In the future, high-energy particle research facilities may one day yield a very high-energy propulsion system that will take us to the nearby stars, or even beyond. This is a timely and comprehensive book, putting spacecraft propulsion systems in perspective.
Fundamentals of Space Biology : Research on Cells, Animals, and Plants in Space
This book is intended as an overview at the undergraduate or early university level and describes the effects of spaceflight at cellular and organism levels. Past, current, and future research on the effects of gravity--or its absence--and ionizing radiation on the evolution, development, and function of living organisms is presented in layman's terms by researchers who have been active in this field. The purpose is to enlighten science and non-science readers to the benefits of space biology research for conducting basic and applied research to support human exploration of space. Also covered are the advantages of approaching the space environment as a laboratory for scientific, technological, and commercial research.
Fundamentals of Robotic Mechanical Systems : Theory, Methods, and Algorithms
Fundamentals of Robotic Mechanical Systems, Third Edition addresses robots at large - such as multi-fingered hands, walking machines, flight simulators, and machine tools - that rely on mechanical systems to perform their tasks. The author establishes the foundations on which the design, control, and implementation of the underlying mechanical subsystems are based. The treatment assumes familiarity with some calculus, linear algebra, and elementary mechanics; however, the elements of rigid-body mechanics and linear transformations are reviewed in the first chapters, making the presentation self-contained.
Functional Verification of Programmable Embedded Architectures : A Top-Down Approach
This book presents a top-down validation methodology that complements the existing bottom-up approaches. It leverages the system architect’s knowledge about the behavior of the design through architecture specification using an Architecture Description Language (ADL). The authors also address two fundamental challenges in functional verification: lack of a golden reference model, and lack of a comprehensive functional coverage metric.
Distant Worlds : Milestones in Planetary Exploration
Peter Bond provides an overview of key, unmanned missions, chapter by chapter, to planets in the twentieth century. He tells the story of the mission planners and engineers who, working mostly in the background, made these unprecedented achievements in scientific exploration possible.
Coordination of Large-Scale Multiagent Systems
Challenges arise when the size of a group of cooperating agents is scaled to hundreds or thousands of members. In domains such as space exploration, military and disaster response, groups of this size (or larger) are required to achieve extremely complex, distributed goals. To effectively and efficiently achieve their goals, members of a group need to cohesively follow a joint course of action while remaining flexible to unforeseen developments in the environment. Coordination of Large-Scale Multiagent Systems provides extensive coverage of the latest research and novel solutions being developed in the field.
Cold Aqueous Planetary Geochemistry with FREZCHEM : From Modeling to the Search for Life at the Limits
At the core of the technical chapters is the FREZCHEM model, initially developed over many years by one of the authors to quantify aqueous electrolyte properties and chemical thermodynamics at subzero temperatures. FREZCHEM, of general relevance to biogeochemists and geochemical modelers, cold planetary scientists, physicochemists and chemical engineers, is subsequently applied to the exploration of biogeochemical applications to solar systems bodies in general, and to speculations about the limits for life in cold environments in particular.
CMOS Multi-Channel Single-Chip Receivers for Multi-Gigabit Optical Data Communications
Focuses on optical communications for short and very short distance applications and discusses the monolithic integration of optical receivers with processing elements in standard CMOS technologies. CMOS Multi-Channel Single-Chip Receivers for Multi-Gigabit Optical Data Communications provides the reader with the necessary background knowledge to fully understand the trade-offs in short-distance communication receiver design and presents the key issues to be addressed in the development of such receivers in CMOS technologies. Moreover, novel design approaches are presented. A system-level design methodology allows for the impact analysis of different block specifications and system-wide design optimization. Statistical models are used for design space exploration in the scope of jitter tolerance analysis of clock recovery circuits.
Lunar and planetary rovers : The wheels of apollo and the Quest for Mars
Provides extensive quotes from the astronauts who drove the LRV on the Moon from interviews conducted especially for the book. It also details new material from interviews of engineers and managers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory covering the robotic rovers, Sojourner, Sprit and Opportunity. The Foreword is written by David R. Scott, Commander of Apollo 15. Chapter 1: From Concept to Reality; Chapter 2: Lunar Roving Vehicle Subsystems; Chapter 3: Training for the Moon; Chapter 4: To the Hadley Plains; Chapter 4: Mysterious and Unknown Descartes; Chapter 5: Destiny at Taurus-Littrow; Chapter Six: The Quest for Mars-Chapter Seven: The New Vision of Exploration.
Living Off the Land in Space : Green Roads to the Cosmos
Draws parallels with the settlement of terrestrial frontiers to investigate how new space propulsion techniques may help future space settlers exploit extraterrestrial resources to establish independence from the Earth. "Living Off the Land in Space," a collaboration among two space scientists and an artist, is illuminated with many NASA-derived computer-generated images, including drawings, and presents the human (as well as the technological) side of space settlement. It will be an inspiring and indispensible source for those wishing to share in this great adventure.
Life in the Universe : Expectations and Constraints
Energy, chemistry, solvents, and habitats -- the basic elements of living systems - define the opportunities and limitations for life on other worlds. This class-tested text examines each of these parameters in crucial depth and makes the argument that life forms we would recognize may be more common in our solar system than many assume. It also considers, however, exotic forms of life that would not have to rely on carbon as basic chemical element, solar energy as a main energy source, or water as primary solvent. Finally the question of detecting bio- and geosignature of such life forms is discussed, ranging from Earth environments to deep space. While speculative considerations in this emerging field of science cannot be avoided, the authors have tried to present their study with the breadth and seriousness that a scientific approach to this issue requires. They seek an operational definition of life and investigate the realm of possibilities that nature offers to realize this very special state of matter and avoid scientific jargon wherever possible to make this intrinsically interdisciplinary subject understandable to a broad range of readers.
La musica del Big Bang : Come la radiazione cosmica di fondo ci ha svelato i segreti dell’Universo = The music of the Big Bang : How the cosmic background radiation revealed the secrets of the Universe to us
Cosmic microwave background radiation is the residue of the great heat following the Big Bang. A tenuous sign, over 13 billion years old, in which the answers to many of the questions about the nature of our Universe are hidden. Discovered by chance in 1964, in the last forty years this fossil trace of the origins of the Cosmos has been explored with every available means. Two Nobel Prizes in physics have already been awarded for research involving it, the last in 2006 for the results of the COBE satellite. Much of the information encoded in the cosmic background radiation was impressed by the superimposition of acoustic waves present in the early Universe: a "music" of the Big Bang, which cosmologists have tried for years to reconstruct, using techniques similar to those that allow to distinguish the sound of different musical instruments. Only recently have the first notes of this extraordinary cosmic symphony finally been revealed, but the investigation is not over yet. This book illustrates, with a language suitable even for non-specialists, the theories, observations and discoveries that have brought cosmology into a new era.
Its ONLY Rocket Science: An Introduction in Plain English
"Well, it’s not rocket science, is it?" How many times have you heard people use that expression when they mean something pretty simple? There are other areas of science and technology that are arguably more challenging than rocket science, but no other (perhaps apart from brain surgery) has entered mainstream English vocabulary as a byword for ‘difficult’.



















