The Story of Collapsing Stars

The Story of Collapsing Stars
Author: Pankaj S. Joshi
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 315
Release: 2015-01-08
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0191510262

This book journeys into one of the most fascinating intellectual adventures of recent decades - understanding and exploring the final fate of massive collapsing stars in the universe. The issue is of great interest in fundamental physics and cosmology today, from both the perspective of gravitation theory and of modern astrophysical observations. This is a revolution in the making and may be intimately connected to our search for a unified understanding of the basic forces of nature, namely gravity that governs the cosmological universe, and the microscopic forces that include quantum phenomena. According to the general theory of relativity, a massive star that collapses catastrophically under its own gravity when it runs out of its internal nuclear fuel must give rise to a space-time singularity. Such singularities are regions in the universe where all physical quantities take their extreme values and become arbitrarily large. The singularities may be covered within a black hole, or visible to faraway observers in the universe. Thus, the final fate of a collapsing massive star is either a black hole or a visible naked singularity. We discuss here recent results and developments on the gravitational collapse of massive stars and possible observational implications when naked singularities happen in the universe. Large collapsing massive stars and the resulting space-time singularities may even provide a laboratory in the cosmos where one could test the unification possibilities of basic forces of nature.

Empire of the Stars

Empire of the Stars
Author: Arthur I. Miller
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Total Pages: 402
Release: 2005
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780618341511

A history of the idea of "black holes" explores the tumultuous debate over the existence of this now well-accepted phenomenon, focusing particular attention on Indian scientist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar.

The Collapsing Universe

The Collapsing Universe
Author: Isaac Asimov
Publisher: Walker & Company
Total Pages: 204
Release: 1977
Genre: Astronomy
ISBN: 9780802704863

In a time of spectacular developments in the new astronomy, the concept of black holes captures top honors. As scientific evidence for them mounts, black holes loom as an ominous development in the life, measured in billions of years, of the universe.

The Collapsing Empire

The Collapsing Empire
Author: John Scalzi
Publisher: Tor Books
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2017-03-21
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0765388898

*2018 LOCUS AWARD WINNER OF BEST SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL* *2018 HUGO AWARD FINALIST FOR BEST NOVEL* “John Scalzi is the most entertaining, accessible writer working in SF today.” —Joe Hill, author of The Fireman The first novel of a new space-opera sequence set in an all-new universe by the Hugo Award-winning, New York Times-bestselling author of Redshirts and Old Man's War Our universe is ruled by physics. Faster than light travel is impossible—until the discovery of The Flow, an extradimensional field available at certain points in space-time, which can take us to other planets around other stars. Riding The Flow, humanity spreads to innumerable other worlds. Earth is forgotten. A new empire arises, the Interdependency, based on the doctrine that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a hedge against interstellar war—and, for the empire’s rulers, a system of control. The Flow is eternal—but it’s not static. Just as a river changes course, The Flow changes as well. In rare cases, entire worlds have been cut off from the rest of humanity. When it’s discovered that the entire Flow is moving, possibly separating all human worlds from one another forever, three individuals—a scientist, a starship captain, and the emperox of the Interdependency—must race against time to discover what, if anything, can be salvaged from an interstellar empire on the brink of collapse. "Fans of Game of Thrones and Dune will enjoy this bawdy, brutal, and brilliant political adventure" —Booklist on The Collapsing Empire "Political plotting, plenty of snark, puzzle-solving, and a healthy dose of action...Scalzi continues to be almost insufferably good at his brand of fun but think-y sci-fi adventure." —Kirkus Reviews on The Collapsing Empire “Scalzi is one of the slickest writers that SF has ever produced.” —The Wall Street Journal on The Human Division The Interdependency Series 1. The Collapsing Empire 2. The Consuming Fire At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Collapse

Collapse
Author: Jared Diamond
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 608
Release: 2013-03-21
Genre: History
ISBN: 0141976969

From the author of Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive is a visionary study of the mysterious downfall of past civilizations. Now in a revised edition with a new afterword, Jared Diamond's Collapse uncovers the secret behind why some societies flourish, while others founder - and what this means for our future. What happened to the people who made the forlorn long-abandoned statues of Easter Island? What happened to the architects of the crumbling Maya pyramids? Will we go the same way, our skyscrapers one day standing derelict and overgrown like the temples at Angkor Wat? Bringing together new evidence from a startling range of sources and piecing together the myriad influences, from climate to culture, that make societies self-destruct, Jared Diamond's Collapse also shows how - unlike our ancestors - we can benefit from our knowledge of the past and learn to be survivors. 'A grand sweep from a master storyteller of the human race' - Daily Mail 'Riveting, superb, terrifying' - Observer 'Gripping ... the book fulfils its huge ambition, and Diamond is the only man who could have written it' - Economis 'This book shines like all Diamond's work' - Sunday Times

Agent to the Stars

Agent to the Stars
Author: John Scalzi
Publisher: Macmillan
Total Pages: 366
Release: 2008-10-28
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1429961430

From New York Times bestseller and Hugo Award-winner, John Scalzi, a gleeful mash-up of science fiction and Hollywood satire The space-faring Yherajk have come to Earth to meet us and to begin humanity's first interstellar friendship. There's just one problem: They're hideously ugly and they smell like rotting fish. So getting humanity's trust is a challenge. The Yherajk need someone who can help them close the deal. Enter Thomas Stein, who knows something about closing deals. He's one of Hollywood's hottest young agents. But although Stein may have just concluded the biggest deal of his career, it's quite another thing to negotiate for an entire alien race. To earn his percentage this time, he's going to need all the smarts, skills, and wits he can muster. Other Tor Books The Android’s Dream Agent to the Stars Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded Fuzzy Nation Redshirts 1. Lock In 2. Head On The Interdepency Sequence 1. The Collapsing Empire 2. The Consuming Fire Old Man's War Series 1. Old Man’s War 2. The Ghost Brigades 3. The Last Colony 4. Zoe’s Tale 5. The Human Division 6. The End of All Things At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Selected Papers, Volume 5

Selected Papers, Volume 5
Author: Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 616
Release: 1990-05-11
Genre: Science
ISBN: 9780226100982

This is the fifth of six volumes collecting significant papers of the distinguished astrophysicist and Nobel laureate S. Chandrasekhar. His work is notable for its breadth as well as for its brilliance; his practice has been to change his focus from time to time to pursue new areas of research. The result has been a prolific career full of discoveries and insights, some of which are only now being fully appreciated. Chandrasekhar has selected papers that trace the development of his ideas and that present aspects of his work not fully covered in the books he has periodically published to summarize his research in each area. Volume 5 covers all of Chandrasekhar's contributions to the general theory of relativity and relativity's astrophysical applications (except his research on black holes and colliding gravitational waves, which is covered in Volume 6). The major topics include the influence of general relativity on the pulsations and stability of stars; the back reaction of gravitational waves on their sources; and post-Newtonian approximations to general relativity and their astrophysical applications. In addition to research papers, the volume includes two 1972 lectures in which Chandrasekhar assessed the past, present, and future of relativistic astrophysics. The foreword by astrophysicist Kip S. Thorne is an absorbing, brief history of the field since 1961, capturing the atmosphere of the early research and clarifying Chandrasekhar's dominant role in it. Chandrasekhar has never written a monograph synthesizing his research in relativistic astrophysics, and therefore this volume of his papers serves as a summary of that work for students and more senior researchers.

The Coming Collapse of China

The Coming Collapse of China
Author: Gordon G. Chang
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2001-09-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1588360210

China is hot. The world sees a glorious future for this sleeping giant, three times larger than the United States, predicting it will blossom into the world's biggest economy by 2010. According to Chang, however, a Chinese-American lawyer and China specialist, the People's Republic is a paper dragon. Peer beneath the veneer of modernization since Mao's death, and the symptoms of decay are everywhere: Deflation grips the economy, state-owned enterprises are failing, banks are hopelessly insolvent, foreign investment continues to decline, and Communist party corruption eats away at the fabric of society. Beijing's cautious reforms have left the country stuck midway between communism and capitalism, Chang writes. With its impending World Trade Organization membership, for the first time China will be forced to open itself to foreign competition, which will shake the country to its foundations. Economic failure will be followed by government collapse. Covering subjects from party politics to the Falun Gong to the government's insupportable position on Taiwan, Chang presents a thorough and very chilling overview of China's present and not-so-distant future.

Collapse (Sneak Peek First Seven Chapters)

Collapse (Sneak Peek First Seven Chapters)
Author: Richard Stephenson
Publisher: Richard Stephenson
Total Pages: 72
Release: 2012-03-17
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1475060645

America is falling, ready to join the Roman Empire as a distant memory in the annals of history. The year is 2027. Tired and desperate, the American people are deep in the middle of The Second Great Depression. The Florida coastline is in ruins from the most powerful hurricane on record; a second just like it is bearing down on the state of Texas. For the first time in history, the Middle East has united as one and amassed the most formidable army the world has seen since the Third Reich. A hidden army of terrorists are on American soil. This is the story of three men - Howard Beck, the world's richest man, also diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, Richard Dupree, ex-Navy SEAL turned escaped convict, and Maxwell Harris, a crippled, burned out Chief of Police of a small Texas town. At first they must fight for their own survival against impossible odds. Finally, the three men must band together to save their beloved country from collapse.