Skip to ContentGo to accessibility pageKeyboard shortcuts menu
OpenStax Logo
Astronomy 2e

For Further Exploration

Astronomy 2eFor Further Exploration
Search for key terms or text.

Articles

Earth

Barbuzano, J. “Earth’s Wellspring.” Sky & Telescope (March 2023): 34. Where did Earth’s water come from, if not comets?

Hartmann, W. “Piecing Together Earth’s Early History.” Astronomy (June 1989): 24. How we know about the distant past.

Klesman, A. “Earth is a Planet Too.” Astronomy (June 2021):16. Seeing Earth as a world and comparing it to other planets.

Naeye, R. “Earth’s Changing Magnetic Field.” Sky & Telescope (March 2018): 16. Historic trends about our magnetosphere.

Redd, N. “Where Did the Earth’s Water Come From?” Astronomy (May 2019): 22. Asteroids, comets, or the solar nebula?

The April 2025 issue of Astronomy magazine was devoted to the topic “Earth as a Planet.”

Impacts

Boslaugh, M. “In Search of Death-Plunge Asteroids.” Astronomy (July 2015): 28. On existing and proposed programs to search for earth-crossing asteroids.

Chyba, C. “Death from the Sky: Tunguska.” Astronomy (December 1993): 38. Excellent review article.

Durda, D. “The Chelyabinsk Super-Meteor.” Sky & Telescope (June 2013): 24. A nice summary with photos and eyewitness reporting.

Eicher, D. “Meteor Crater: Inside and Out.” Astronomy (January 2019): 32. The crater’s history, geology, and tour guidance.

Kring, D. “Blast from the Past.” Astronomy (August 2006): 46. Six-page introduction to Arizona’s meteor crater.

Schultz, P. & Dobbins, T. “Cosmic Cataclysm in South America.” Sky & Telescope (November 2022): 22. On regions that were hit by ancient low-altitude airbursts from comets.

Shubinski, R. “Earth’s Greatest Hits.” Astronomy (September 2022): 56. Some of the impact craters that large chunks from space have made.

Tyson, P. “Space Invaders: The Impact Hazard.” Sky & Telescope (June 2018): 12. How many near-Earth asteroids of different sizes are there?

Websites

Earth

Astronaut Photography of Earth from Space: https://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/. A site with dramatic and informative images and captions.

Astronomers For Planet Earth: https://a4e.org/. International grass-roots movement of astronomy students, educators, amateurs and scientists, to address the climate crisis from an astronomical perspective. Lots of good background information on global warming.

Exploration of the Earth’s Magnetosphere: http://phy6.org/Education/Intro.html. An educational website by retired NASA scientist Dr. Daniel Stern.

NASA Goddard: Earth from Space: Fifteen Amazing Things in 15 Years: https://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/earth-from-space-15-amazing-things-in-15-years. Fifteen key images and videos that revealed things and influenced our thinking about our planet and its atmosphere.

Understanding Earth as a System: https://scied.ucar.edu/learning-zone/earth-system/understanding-earth-as-system. A rich learning site from the National Center for Atmospheric Research.

U.S. Geological Survey: Earthquake Information Center: https://www.usgs.gov/programs/earthquake-hazards/education. A good place to help you understand our current knowledge of earthquakes.

Winds on Planet Earth: https://earth.nullschool.net/. Real-time globe of Earth showing wind patterns; click on your location. Globe can be rotated and zoomed to your preferred view.

Impacts

B612 Foundation : https://b612foundation.org/. This nonprofit, named after a fictional asteroid in the children’s book The Little Prince, was set up by astronauts and scientists to encourage research and education about the asteroid threat to Earth.

How Historic Comet Impact Led to Planetary Defense: https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/goddard/how-historic-jupiter-comet-impact-led-to-planetary-defense/. Nice article and video on how the impact of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter led to a much greater awareness of cosmic impacts.

Lunar and Planetary Institute: Introduction to Terrestrial Impact Craters: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/publications/slidesets/craters/. A guide with images.

Meteor Crater Tourist Site: http://meteorcrater.com/. A fancy site for visitors to the large impact crater in Arizona.

NASA/Jet Propulsion Lab Near Earth Object Program: https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/. This rich website has information on all asteroids and comets known to get close to the Earth. Look for the introductory video guide to help you get oriented.

What Are Near-Earth-Objects: http://spaceguardcentre.com/what-are-neos/. From the British Spaceguard Centre, which also monitors asteroids and comets that come close to us; start with this page and then explore their menu.

Videos

Earth

Earth: The Operator’s Manual: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RyvpsIx47E. A National Science Foundation–sponsored video on climate change and energy, with geologist Richard Alley (53:42).

Earth at Night: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfII0I49QEE. Narrated story of the SUMI-NPP satellite, which takes images of our planet at night (1:36).

Earth’s Magnetosphere: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4FSg-90XlA. NASA’s introduction to the protective magnetic zone around us and its role in space weather affecting Earth (3:37).

PBS NOVA Videos about Earth: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/. Programs and articles about planet Earth from public television's science show.

The Physics of the Greenhouse Effect: https://ca.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/phy03.sci.phys.matter.greenhouse2/global-warming-the-physics-of-the-greenhouse-effect/. A quick overview about why it is good and can be bad if too much greenhouse gas is in our atmosphere (2:15). There are several other useful short videos on global warming issues on the same page.

Understanding the Outer Reaches of Earth’s Atmosphere: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dD5S4Va2Kh8. Explains how new space probes are helping us to understand changes in our ionosphere (3:38).

Views of Home: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfpaxVQSbTQ. How NASA missions have provided dramatic images of the Earth from space and even from Mars (4:24).

Impacts

Chelyabinsk Meteor: Can We Survive a Bigger Impact?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-e6xyUZLLs. A talk on Earth impacts by our textbook’s senior author Dr. David Morrison (1:34:48).

Large Asteroid Impact Simulation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bU1QPtOZQZU. Future large asteroid impact with Earth; simulation from the Discovery Channel (4:45).

Meteor Hits Russia February 15, 2013: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpmXyJrs7iU. Remarkable archive of much eyewitness footage to the impact over Chelyabinsk (10:11).

Near Earth Objects: https://www.eso.org/public/videos/esocast168a/. ESOCast, with astronomer Olivier Hainaut. Introducing near-Earth asteroids and comets, and how we study them and worry about their impacts (6:14).

Sentinel Mission: Finding an Asteroid Headed for Earth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efz8c3ijD_A. Public lecture by astronaut Ed Lu (1:08:57).

25 Years Since Comets Collide with Jupiter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7RP2SW_gSw. Brief review of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 and the time its fragments collided with Jupiter, giving the world a wake-up call about impacts (2:38).

Citation/Attribution

This book may not be used in the training of large language models or otherwise be ingested into large language models or generative AI offerings without OpenStax's permission.

Want to cite, share, or modify this book? This book uses the Creative Commons Attribution License and you must attribute OpenStax.

Attribution information
  • If you are redistributing all or part of this book in a print format, then you must include on every physical page the following attribution:

    Access for free at https://openstax.org/books/astronomy-2e/pages/1-introduction

  • If you are redistributing all or part of this book in a digital format, then you must include on every digital page view the following attribution:

    Access for free at https://openstax.org/books/astronomy-2e/pages/1-introduction

Citation information

© Jul 16, 2025 OpenStax. Textbook content produced by OpenStax is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License . The OpenStax name, OpenStax logo, OpenStax book covers, OpenStax CNX name, and OpenStax CNX logo are not subject to the Creative Commons license and may not be reproduced without the prior and express written consent of Rice University.