Product Description
Self-contained astronomy projects for introductory astronomy courses taught at schools using Voyager III, the dynamic sky simulator program developed by Carina Software.Projects treat topics in solar system, stellar, and galactic astronomy. ... Read more

Product Description
Includes the historical perspective of astronomy, skybasics and the celestial coordinate systems, a model and the origin ofthe solar system, the sun, the planets, Kepler's Laws of PlanetaryMotion, planetary satellites, asteroids, eclipses, tides, stars, time, andbinoculars and telescopes. ... Read more

Product Description
Why does the starlit sky hold such a profound fascination for us?
Perhaps because it is there that we encounter, commingled, the mystery of light and darkness two primal experiences connected with the beginning and end of human life.

Perhaps it comes from seeing the order, both overt and occult, in the movement of celestial spheres, with which we sense ourselves secretly involved.

Perhaps it is because we feel so small before the starry universe and in this way we begin to become aware within ourselves of the grand questions regarding our existence and our passing through life.

Why are there telescopes on the roof of the Pope's Summer home in Castel Gandolfo?

For more than 100 years, the Vatican has supported an astronomical observatory. But that should come as no surprise; from even before the Gregorian Reform of the Calendar in 1582, indeed dating back to the invention of the University (where studying astronomy was a requirement for anyone wanting a doctorate in philosophy or theology!) the Church has not only supported astronomical research...it has seen the study of the Heavens as a way of getting to know the Creator!

In honor of the International Year of Astronomy, the Vatican and its Observatory is delighted to present this small expression of support, filled with beautiful images from the Vatican's telescopes and wisdom from the Popes, to show that indeed. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Exalting beauty
An interesting history of the Vatican Observatory.The articles are informative and inspiring, the pictures are
exquisitely beautiful.

Haven't read it but my dad liked it
I bought this for my dad for Christmas and he seems to like it.I saw the author on The Colbert Report and thought, "hey, my dad is both a devout Catholic and an astronomy enthusiast".It's more of a coffee table book but I was impressed by the author and thought it would be right up Dad's alley.He tells me it was a great choice so I guess I can recommend it to anyone interested in astronomy, the Vatican, or a Catholic perspective on the Universe.

Copy Edit
I bought this book as a Christmas present for my wife.The book is beautiful as everybody else has indicated and my wife states that it is a good read and interesting. She likes the book as it combines her interests in science and faith

That being said, my wife who has considered becoming a copy editor, is constantly reading sentences to me from the book with the prefix, "What is wrong with this sentence?"In all honesty, *I* would have never picked up on the errors, but if you are a linguistic savant, you might be bothered by some of the issues that bothers her.Overall she is happy with the book, but as she put it, "it's a shame that such a beautiful book is tarnished by such poor copy editing."

Great blend of Astronomy and Religion
I will admit, I am a little bias.I am a practicing Roman Catholic and a self-proclaimed amateur astronomer.
However, I think this book is incredible.It was put together well with gorgeous pictures taken from the Vatican's observatory.
It does not force one to to believe one way or the other, but it does show how religion and science can co-exist in a
symbiotic relationship....it blends the two, well.

I would definitely recommend this for anyone who practices their faith regardless if you are Catholic.

The Heaven's Proclaim
I recently received an e-mail from Amazon.com inviting me to write a review for a book I had purchased from them, "The Heavens Proclaim."I am delighted to oblige. 1.) because it's a great book. 2.) because it's edited by my son, Brother Guy Consolmagno of the Vatican Observatory.

As a collection of articles on various aspects of astronomy by a dozen astronomers, the book is the equivalent of an overview college course on the subject. It also explains the Vatican's centuries-old interest in Astronomy.The book is a large coffee-table tome, beautifully printed and stunningly illistrated.it cost me $26 from Amazon. And Guy's tuition at MIT. ... Read more

Product Description
ONLINE JOURNEY THROUGH® ASTRONOMY is a complete online introductory astronomy course with a student companion workbook. It is available in four configurations: a complete two-term course, a brief course, a solar system course, and a stars and galaxies course. It is intended as a stand-alone product, but can be bundled with any Brooks/Cole Thomson Learning introductory astronomy book. ONLINE JOURNEY THROUGH® ASTRONOMY modules contain text supported by images and more than 400 interactive animations and simulations, links to other web sites, objectives, graded exercises, quizzes with immediate feedback, additional exercises, critical-thinking exercises, problems, glossary, index, and astronomical calculators.The Student Companion is available to accompany any of the courses. A complete Instructor's Implementation Guide provides chapters that describe how to create and manage an online course, sample syllabi, chapter objectives, and teaching tips for specific topics by chapter. It also gives navigation detials and technical requirements. ... Read more

Product Description
This substantially rewritten and expanded fourth edition outlines the most up-to-date methods and tools of radio astronomy. Tools of Radio Astronomy gives a unified treatment of the entire field of radio astronomy, from centimeter to sub-millimeter wavelengths and using single telescopes as well as interferometers. The basic physical principles are described and a complete outline of the instrumentation, observational techniques, and methods of measurement and analysis are given. The goal of this standard reference and text is to prepare readers to carry out observations and relate the data to physical processes in interstellar space. In this fourth edition, the chapter on interferometry and aperture synthesis has been thoroughly revised in the light of most recent developments, as has been the chapter on molecules in interstellar space, and material on receiver technology. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A "must have" for RA. business
this is one of the fundamental books you have to have in your library... if you are a "Radio Astronomy" guy (Engineer, astronomer,etc). However sometimes it can be a little bit complex (compared to its newest 5th edition), but still an excellent book.

One of the best introductions to the field
Although Rohlfs and Wilson have only made perfunctory changesbetween this and the previous edition of the book, it still stands asone of the best introductions to the field of radio astronomy.It still doesn't cover some topics (such as calibration techniques) as well as I would have liked, and Kraus' _Radio Astronomy_ (2e) does a better job (IMHO) on the mathematical details as well as specific applications.Because of its length, the topics of millimeter and submillimeter astronomy are not covered in as much as centimeter wavelengths.However despite all this, the book is highly readable for a student in the field, and is invaluable to have on one's bookshelf, or even to take observing (for those who only dabble in radio astronomy). ... Read more

Product Description
Contains graduate-level problems with presented solutions and covers topics in radio astronomy. Examples from all branches of radio astronomy throughout. Softcover. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Not really useful
I bought this book together with Tools of Radio Astronomy Fifth Edition, and I must say I am a bit disappointed. Roughly one half of the exercises in this book are also at the end of each chapter in "Tools", and the latter provides some new exercises as well that have not been included in this book. Moreover, references to formulae and figures have not been updated to the 5th edition of "Tools", so that when you read "Use eq. (4.5) of Tools" you are not sure where to look at.

Sure, unlike "Tools" this book includes the solutions of every problem, but the exercises are either plain applications of formulae (like e.g. "Given eq. NNN in Tools, calculate the temperature of...") or derivations of well-known models and formulae (like Planck's derivation of the blackbody's brightness) which can be found in a lot of other textbooks (and with more detail!). I would have been happy to see more exercises on "real" data, like e.g. asking the user to retrieve some published paper and justify the results reported in it.

Given the small size of the book (roughly 160 pages) and its relatively high price, I would *not* advise peoply to buy it -- it is enough to have the 5th edition of "Tools". ... Read more

Product Description

This book offers a unique review of how astronomical information handling (in the broad sense) evolved in the course of the 20th century, and especially during its second half. It will be very useful for researchers, teachers, editors, publishers, librarians, computer scientists, sociologists of science, research planners and strategists, project managers, public-relations officers, plus those in charge of astronomy-related organizations, as well as by students aiming at a career in astronomy or related space science.

Customer Reviews (1)

Easy to read
I used this book in my Astronomy class and it was very easy to read.It has very short chapters and they are to the point and interesting. ... Read more

Product Description
Astronomy, throughout almost all of human history, has been a naked eye activity.There is no better way to learn Astronomy than to first observe what you can see without a telescope.

This is a sampler of Deep Sky Naked Eye Field Guide for Kindle:167 Step by Step MapsTo purchase the full version of this field guide, click on "Show more formats" in "Formats" box above..

This sampler demonstrates how vividly these step-by-step maps are displayed on the Kindle and explains how use the maps to find deep sky objects with the naked eye.All of the information contained in this sampler is contained in the full version as well.

The full version of the Kindle naked eye field guide includes maps for 9 galaxies, 5 emission nebulae, 2 globular clusters, 2 planetary nebula and 16 open clusters.Almost every type of deep sky object is represented, and objects from every part of the sky are included. The user will be able to locate deep sky objects any night of the year.

The 167 step-by-step maps in the field guide were conceived, designed and formatted specifically for the Kindle.With this innovation, the amateur astronomer can now go paperless. The maps illuminate clearly on the Kindle with a white or red flashlight.

This field guide can be usedsimultaneously on a laptop, iPhone, iPad and the Kindle.Using the "Kindle for PC" on the laptop, the maps can be displayed full screen on a jet black screen, while the brightness can be adjusted to a minimum.This is a remarkable display unmatched by web browsers or other applications.

The iPad - iPhone version of the field guide is exceptional as well.The maps are brilliant white on black with virtually no glare.

Each deep sky object is displayed with a layered series of maps that progressively build a context of constellations and nearby stars.On the maps, the stars, constellations and deep sky objects are displayed in vivid white, and the sky is black.

Particularly useful are the Reference Lines Maps™ that guide the user to each deep sky object.Bright 4th magnitude reference stars serve as end points for each reference line.Deep sky objects are mapped in order as they traverse the sky throughout each night and throughout the year. Because reference line end-point stars are often repeated from one object to the next, after locating a deep sky object it is often easy to locate the next.

The beauty of the Reference Lines Method™ is that in order to locate deep sky objects, you need only to locate the bright stars that outline the constellations.It is not necessary to mark out degrees in the sky or have a magnifying finder telescope.

A word about the editor:"Devon Ronsse proved to be a perfect fit for the task of editing the manuscript.He matched the demographic of a large sector of our intended audience.On the one hand, we are unveiling a method to locate deep sky objects that will be helpful to veteran stargazers.On the other hand, we wanted to be certain that a novice could download this field guide to a Kindle and begin locating deep sky objects that same night.His fresh perspective, attention to detail and insistence on clarity proved immeasurably valuable."Renaix ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

bestseller for a reason
It's easy to see why this book has rocketed to the top of Amazon's bestseller list. This field guide makes it possible to locate deep sky objects in ordinary backyard skies.I guess we knew that someone would eventually come up with a way to use the liquid ink technology to map deep sky objects, but it took some thinking.It's amazing how they found a way to map deep sky objects using the bright stars in the constellations.
Plus, we had tried before to use other maps from our laptop, but the glare was just too much, even with the brightness set to zero--but by combining the zero setting on the "Kindle for PC" and the zero monitor setting, I was able to mostly eliminate the glare from the monitor.Now we have two field guides for the price of one.We don't have an iPhone, and we can't get Amazon's Kindle=Blackberry app to work--but if we can we'll have 3 sets of maps--and all better than anything we ever had before.Bravo.

fantastic
I teach an introductory Astronomy course at our local junior college.I cannot tell you how useful this field guide is to my students.For the last several years we have taken the class up on the mountain for a weekend to study the deep sky.We will probably continue to do that, but now our students will be able to find deep sky objects on their own once the course is over. It's never been a problem seeing the objects in a small telescope or even binoculars.The problem has been finding the objects in anything other than perfect conditions. These maps work just fine in the ordinary skies most of our students have available to them on a regular basis.
We've been looking for a way to go paperless for a long time and finally we have it.
Because each field guide can be used simultaneously on the laptop and the Kindle, we get two field guides for the price of one.I have to say, the maps are awesome illuminated with the red light on the Kindle, but the laptop version with Amazon's Kindle for PC is superb as well.
This book gets a 5+

Excellent book for beginners!
This book is great! I don't own a telescope, although I have done a little observing with binoculars with limited success.It hadn't really occurred to me that I could have just as much fun without any equipment.This book has helped me understand that I already have the best observing equipment I will ever own - My own two eyes. The maps are really helpful and easy to understand, and the instructional guides are clear and easy to follow. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

great price
much cheeper then new. and its was still new. don't ever buy from campus book stores again, amazon is the way to go

Necessary for a Class
This book was necessary for a class but I also found it interesting and I am learning a lot more that I did not know before.

Far from the best!
I am teaching an introductory astronomy course this semester, and chose to use this book because others before me had used it.In the end, I was very disappointed.The author devotes very few pages to several important topics, while devoting too much material to trivial information.The figures, while adequate, could be greatly improved.There is also not much math in this text, and on occasion I have found a few things that were downright wrong.Online support (for either students or instructors) was minimal.However, the copy of Starry Night Pro included with the text makes it almost worth the purchase price, and we ended up designing several labs around this excellent program.

Explorations
This book is very detailed and the CD-Rom has excellent pictures.The only downfall is that the mathmatical functions are not detailed enough for me.

up to date introduction
A very solid, and up to date discussion of modern astronomy. Well suited for undergraduate astronomy majors taking a first course. You get a coherent formulation of our best understanding of galaxy formation on a cosmological scale. And also how first and second generation stars appear and evolve. Then, within a stellar system, how planets can condense out of gas.

Naturally, our solar system is well described. From both observations made on Earth and by satellites (especially the Hubble), and by US and Russian probes.

The CD will appeal to some of you. Arny has put considerable effort into it. But the main text stands well, even if the CD is missing. ... Read more