What will happen if (perhaps when) humanity makes contact with another civilisation on a different planet?In 1974 a message was beamed towards the stars by the giant Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico, a brief blast of radio waves designed to alert extraterrestrial civilisations to our existence. Of course, we don't know if such civilisations really exist. For the past six decades a small cadre of researchers have been on a quest to find out, as part of SETI, the sea...

Tilt and shift lenses offer tremendous creative possibilities for users of digital SLR and mirrorless cameras. This practical book explains the techniques that will help you take better photos - photos that don't distort or lose focus. Assessing the benefits and pitfalls of a range of lenses, adapters, software and editing techniques, it guides you through the practicalities of working with these lenses and gives you the skills to use them to best effect. With stunning examples throughout,...

The quest to find a theory of quantum gravity that could potentially explain everything.Nearly 60 years ago, Nobel Prize-winners Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson stumbled across a mysterious hiss of faint radio static that was interfering with their observations. They had found the key to unravelling the story of the Big Bang and the origin of our universe.That signal was the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), the earliest light in the univer...

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to watch a double sunset on Tatooine, stand among the sand dunes of Arrakis or gaze at the gas-giant planet Polyphemus from the moon Pandora? In Amazing Worlds of Science Fiction and Science Fact, Keith Cooper explores the fictional planets of films such as Star Wars, Dune and Avatar, and discusses how realistic they are based on our current scientific understanding and astronomical observations. The real exop...

Taking the Mask Off... was a hard book for me to write.What started out as daily journal entries that centered around losses, regrets, family, and the beauty of nature, all written during COVID isolation but covering my entire life's experience were now over 150 handwritten short stories contained in four 5 x 7-inch memorandum books filled in front to back.It took me six months to realize that my writings were more than simple journalling; they were therapy. Therap...

This is a journey taking you into a young woman’s unbelievable reality while trapped in a world that could have physically, emotionally and spiritually destroyed her-- a world from which only a few successfully escape and even fewer recover. You will get insight into her childhood, teenage, college and young adult years. Her dad shares his pain and purpose as their relationship and their destinies unfold. Where or to whom do you run to when you realize you have made a terrifying, possibly ...

The premise of this book is that it is simply impossible to determine, with any degree of confidence, as to whether there is a transcendent, creative being which is responsible for the existence of the universe. Therefore, the conclusion that inevitably flows from this realization is that the most intellectually honest position to espouse is one of agnosticism. A corollary of this idea is that it is also impossible to know if our lives are anything more than a random sequence of events ord...

In 1974 a message was beamed towards the stars by the giant Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico, a brief blast of radio waves designed to alert extraterrestrial civilizations to our existence. Of course, we don't know if such civilizations really exist. But for the past six decades a small cadre of researchers have been on a quest to find out, as part of SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.However, the act of transmitting raises troubling questions about the process of ...

Nearly sixty years ago, Nobel Prize-winners Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson stumbled across a mysterious hiss of faint radio static that was interfering with their astronomical observations. In it, they had found the key to unravelling the story of the Big Bang and the origin of our universe. That signal was the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), the earliest light in the universe, released 379,000 years after the Big Bang. It contains secrets about what happened during the very first tiny ...

A wry and compelling take on the who, how, and why of near-future colonies in space. From bone-whittling microgravity to eye-popping profits, the risks and rewards of space settlement have never been so close at hand.More than fifty years after the Apollo 11 moon landing, why is there so little human presence in space? Will we ever reach Mars? What will it take to become a multiplanet species, colonizing the solar system and traveling to other stars?Spa...

All the matter and light we can see in the universe makes up a trivial 5 per cent of everything. The rest is hidden. This could be the biggest puzzle that science has ever faced. Since the 1970s, astronomers have been aware that galaxies have far too little matter in them to account for the way they spin around: they should fly apart, but something concealed holds them together. That ’something' is dark matter – invisible material in five times the quantity of the familiar stuff of stars a...

In The Universe, today's most influential science writers explain the science behind our evolving understanding of the universe and everything in it, including the cutting-edge research and discoveries that are shaping our knowledge.Lee Smolin reveals how math and cosmology are helping us create a theory of the whole universe.Neil Turok analyzes the fundamental laws of nature, what came before the big bang, and the possibili...