| Edition |
First U.S. edition. |
| Description |
viii, 294 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm |
| Contents |
The man who looked for blinking stars -- The man who looked for wobbling stars -- Hot Jupiters : who ordered those? -- An ancient question -- The dwarf-star strategy -- Imagining alien atmospheres -- Invasion of the female exoplaneteers -- Kepler approved -- Waiting for launch -- Kepler scooped -- "A 100 percent chance of life" -- The Kepler era begins -- Beyond Kepler -- How many Earths? -- What does "habitable" really mean? -- A world made of rock, at last -- Astronomers in paradise -- Sara's birthday party. |
| Summary |
"In the mid-1990s, astronomers made history when they detected three planets orbiting stars in the Milky Way. The planets were nothing like Earth, however: They were giant gas balls like Jupiter or Saturn. More than five hundred planets have been found since then, yet none of them could support life. Now, armed with more powerful technology, planet hunters are racing to find a true twin of Earth. Science writer Michael D. Lemonick has unique access to these exoplaneteers, as they call themselves, and Mirror Earth unveils their passionate quest. Geoff Marcy, at the University of California, Berkeley, is the world's most successful planet hunter, having found two of the first three extra-solar planets. Bill Borucki, at the NASA Ames Research Center, struggled for more than a decade to launch the Kepler mission--the only planet finder, human or machine, to beat Marcy's record. David Charbonneau, at Harvard, realized that Earths would be much easier to find if he looked at tiny stars called M-dwarfs rather than stars like the Sun--and that he could use backyard telescopes to find them! Unlike those in other races, the competing scientists actually consult and cooperate with one another. But only one will be the first to find Earth's twin. Mirror Earth is poised to narrate this historic event as the discovery is made"-- Provided by publisher. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Subject |
Extrasolar planets.
|
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Earth (Planet)
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Planetary science.
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| ISBN |
9780802779007 hardback $26.00 |
|
080277900X hardback |
|
