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Astronomy

For Further Exploration

AstronomyFor Further Exploration

Articles

The January 2021 issue of Astronomy magazine is devoted to our modern understanding of the beginning and end of the universe.

Kruesi, L. “Cosmology: 5 Things You Need to Know.” Astronomy (May 2007): 28. Five questions students often ask, and how modern cosmologists answer them.

Kruesi, L. “How Planck Has Redefined the Universe.” Astronomy (October 2013): 28. Good review of what this space mission has told us about the CMB and the universe.

Lineweaver, C. & Davis, T. “Misconceptions about the Big Bang.” Scientific American (March 2005): 36. Some basic ideas about modern cosmology clarified, using general relativity.

Nadis, S. “Sizing Up Inflation.” Sky & Telescope (November 2005): 32. Nice review of the origin and modern variants on the inflationary idea.

Nadis, S. “How We Could See Another Universe.” Astronomy (June 2009): 24. On modern ideas about multiverses and how such bubbles of space-time might collide.

Nadis, S. “Dark Energy’s New Face: How Exploding Stars Are Changing our View.” Astronomy (July 2012): 45. About our improving understanding of the complexities of type Ia supernovae.

Naze, Y. “The Priest, the Universe, and the Big Bang.” Astronomy (November 2007): 40. On the life and work of Georges Lemaître.

Panek, R. “Going Over to the Dark Side.” Sky & Telescope (February 2009): 22. A history of the observations and theories about dark energy.

Pendrick, D. “Is the Big Bang in Trouble?” Astronomy (April 2009): 48. This sensationally titled article is really more of a quick review of how modern ideas and observations are fleshing out the Big Bang hypothesis (and raising questions.)

Reddy, F. “How the Universe Will End.” Astronomy (September 2014): 38. Brief discussion of local and general future scenarios.

Riess, A. and Turner, M. “The Expanding Universe: From Slowdown to Speedup.” Scientific American (September 2008): 62.

Turner, M. “The Origin of the Universe.” Scientific American (September 2009): 36. An introduction to modern cosmology.

Websites

Cosmology Primer: https://preposterousuniverse.com/cosmologyprimer/. Caltech Astrophysicist Sean Carroll offers a non-technical site with brief overviews of many key topics in modern cosmology.

How Big Is the Universe?: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/space/how-big-universe.html. A clear essay by a noted astronomer Brent Tully summarizes some key ideas in cosmology and introduces the notion of the acceleration of the universe.

Universe 101: WMAP Mission Introduction to the Universe: http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/. Concise NASA primer on cosmological ideas from the WMAP mission team.

Cosmic Times Project: http://cosmictimes.gsfc.nasa.gov/. James Lochner and Barbara Mattson have compiled a rich resource of twentieth-century cosmology history in the form of news reports on key events, from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Videos

The Day We Found the Universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HV23qWIieBw. Distinguished science writer Marcia Bartusiak discusses Hubble’s work and the discovery of the expansion of the cosmos.

Images of the Infant Universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0AqCwElyUk. Lloyd Knox’s public talk on the latest discoveries about the CMB and what they mean for cosmology (1:16:00).

Runaway Universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNYVFrnmcOU. Roger Blandford (Stanford Linear Accelerator Center) public lecture on the discovery and meaning of cosmic acceleration and dark energy (1:08:08).

From the Big Bang to the Nobel Prize and on to the James Webb Space Telescope and the Discovery of Alien Life: http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a010000/a010300/a010370/index.html. John Mather, NASA Goddard (1:01:02). His Nobel Prize talk from Dec. 8, 2006 can be found at http://www.nobelprize.org/mediaplayer/index.php?id=74&view=1.

Supernovae and the Discovery of the Accelerating Universe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D6cwrl0CxA. A public lecture by Nobel Laureate Adam Riess in 2019 (58 min).

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