Download or read book Luis Walter lvarez written by Tina Randall and published by Capstone Classroom. This book was released on 2005-01-18 with total page 68 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents a short biography of physicist, Luis Walter Alvarez, and examines his Hispanic and Irish heritage, early interest and education in science, his work with Enrico Fermi and involvement with the Manhattan Project, and numerous awards and honors.
Download or read book Alvarez Adventures of a Physicist written by Luis W. Alvarez and published by Plunkett Lake Press. This book was released on 2019-08-08 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During World War II, Luis W. Alvarez participated in the Allies’ development of radar at the MIT Radiation Laboratory, and of the atomic bomb at Los Alamos. He then worked as an experimental physicist on cyclotrons, particle accelerators and bubble chambers at UC-Berkeley with Ernest Lawrence. Later in life, he used cosmic rays to “X ray” an Egyptian pyramid, developed a new theory about the extinction of the dinosaurs, and won the 1968 Nobel prize in physics for his work on elementary particles. In this autobiography, Alvarez shares insights on the process of scientific discovery, risk-taking in science and how theoretical and experimental physics interact. “[A] delightful autobiography... [A] fascinating book... It should be read by everyone who is interested in science and adventure, or who just wants to meet one of our most fascinating contemporaries.” — James Trefil, New York Times Book Review “Beyond its self-portrait, Alvarez provides an exceptionally clear view of the world of science.” — Alan Lightman, Washington Post Book World “This is a richly absorbing autobiography... Personally as well as scientifically forthright and plainspoken, [Alvarez] holds the reader with the story of his life as a scientist, much of the time at Berkeley, Calif., working with such men as Robert Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence and Enrico Fermi.” — Publishers Weekly “A gripping book. It succeeds well in making the scientific experience and the excitement of discovery accessible to the general reader.” — Richard L. Garwin,Physics Today “A fascinating life.” — Elena Brunet, Los Angeles Times “One of the best popular books on science to emerge from the laboratory in years.” — Henry Kisor, Chicago Sun-Times “Luis W. Alvarez has an unsurpassed reputation among scientists for a lifelong record of crucial participation in important discoveries in pure and applied science. In this book he performs an additional service by revealing his thought processes.” — Philip Abelson, Science Advisor, American Association for the Advancement of Science
Download or read book T rex and the Crater of Doom written by Walter Alvarez and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2015-09-15 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sixty-five million years ago, a comet or asteroid larger than Mount Everest slammed into the Earth, inducing an explosion equivalent to the detonation of a hundred million hydrogen bombs. Vaporized detritus blasted through the atmosphere upon impact, falling back to Earth around the globe. Disastrous environmental consequences ensued: a giant tsunami, continent-scale wildfires, darkness, and cold, followed by sweltering greenhouse heat. When conditions returned to normal, half the plant and animal genera on Earth had perished. This horrific chain of events is now widely accepted as the solution to a great scientific mystery: what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs? Walter Alvarez, one of the Berkeley scientists who discovered evidence of the impact, tells the story behind the development of the initially controversial theory. It is a saga of high adventure in remote locations, of arduous data collection and intellectual struggle, of long periods of frustration ended by sudden breakthroughs, of friendships made and lost, and of the exhilaration of discovery that forever altered our understanding of Earth's geological history.
Download or read book Luis W Alvarez written by Corinn Codye and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the life of the scientist who worked on the atomic bomb, developed a radar system, and won the 1968 Nobel Prize for physics.
Download or read book Luis Walter Alvarez Biography written by and published by . This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Nobel Foundation presents a biographical sketch of American physicist Luis Walter Alvarez (1911- ). Alvarez was awarded the 1968 Nobel prize in physics for his contributions to elementary particle physics. The foundation highlights his education, his career, his research, his work, and his accomplishments.
Download or read book Biographical information on Luis Walter Alvarez written by and published by . This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Discovering Alvarez written by Luis W. Alvarez and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1987-12-30 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Luis W. Alvarez has had a breathtakingly varied and important career of discovery, adventure, and invention. The winner of the 1968 Nobel Prize in physics for his work on subatomic particles, Alvarez participated as a scientific observer of the Hiroshima bombing mission, formulated the asteroid theory of dinosaur extinctions, discovered the radioactivity of tritium, took x-rays of the Second Pyramid at Giza, designed the Berkeley proton linear accelerator, first observed fundamental particle resonances, created the variable-focus thin lens, analyzed the Kennedy assassination film, and invented the Ground Control Approach radar system for airplane landings, to name but a few of his experiences and accomplishments. Discovering Alvarez collects articles by this innovative physicist, documenting his outstanding contributions. The articles, which span his career, are accompanied by a remarkable collection of commentary by the colleagues and students who worked closely with Alvarez on each project or discovery.
Download or read book Physics 1963 1970 written by and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 1998 with total page 366 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: http://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/3729
Download or read book Luis Walter Alvarez ELL written by and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Luis Alvarez and the Development of the Bubble Chamber written by Amy Allison and published by . This book was released on 2002-08 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the life of the physicist who, among other achievements, was awarded the 1968 Nobel Prize for physics for developing the hydrogen bubble chamber, a powerful tool for tracking atomic particles.
Download or read book A Most Improbable Journey A Big History of Our Planet and Ourselves written by Walter Alvarez and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2016-11-15 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A thrilling synthesis from a brilliant scientist who discovered one of the most important chapters in our history." —Sean B. Carroll Big History, the field that integrates traditional historical scholarship with scientific insights to study the full sweep of our universe, has so far been the domain of historians. Famed geologist Walter Alvarez—best known for the “Impact Theory” explaining dinosaur extinction—has instead championed a science-first approach to Big History. Here he wields his unique expertise to give us a new appreciation for the incredible occurrences—from the Big Bang to the formation of supercontinents, the dawn of the Bronze Age, and beyond—that have led to our improbable place in the universe.
Download or read book The Mountains of Saint Francis Discovering the Geologic Events That Shaped Our Earth written by Walter Alvarez and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2008-12-17 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the world's leading geologists takes readers into Italy's Apennine Mountain Range—the Mountains of Saint Francis—on a journey to discover the fascinating secrets of the Earth's deep history. Modern geologists, Walter Alvarez among them, showed in the last decades of the twentieth century that the history of our planet has witnessed events profoundly more dramatic than even the most spectacular chapters in human history. More violent than wars, more life altering than revolutions—understanding the geologic events that have shaped the Earth's surface is the quest and the passion of geologists. In the knowledgeable and graceful prose of Alvarez, general readers are led to explore the many mysteries that our planet guards. The author has chosen Italy as a microcosm in which to explore this amazing past for several reasons. First, it is the land where the earliest geologists learned how to read the history of the Earth, written in nature’s rock archives. Second, it is where Alvarez and his Italian geological friends have continued to decipher the rock record, uncovering more historical episodes from the Earth’s past. And third, the lovely land of Italy is unusually rich in geological treasures and offers examples of the key processes that have created the landscapes of the entire world. The Mountains of Saint Francis begins in Rome. We discover that the landscape of Rome was built by violent volcanic eruptions in the very recent past, almost certainly witnessed by our human ancestors. Next we travel to Siena and come face to face with a fundamental discovery of the geologists—that much of the dry land that we currently inhabit was once underwater, beneath ancient seas or oceans. Then we stop in the small medieval city of Gubbio and contemplate the amazing secret that the limestone rocks kept hidden for 65 million years—that a huge asteroid smashed into the Earth, disrupting the environment so severely that the dinosaurs, and perhaps half of the other forms of life inhabiting the Earth at the time, disappeared forever, opening the way for the rise of the mammals and eventually of humans. The impact theory that came from those Italian limestones at Gubbio was one of the great geological discoveries of the twentieth century. Just as important to the field of geology was the theory of plate tectonics—the understanding that the outer layer of the Earth is divided into crustal plates that move around, sometimes carrying continents into collisions with one another, like the great collision between Italy and Europe that built the Alps. And yet, to explain the Mountains of Saint Francis requires something more than a collision between continents. These are mountains that are still jealously guarding the secret of their past, and in this book we go along with the geological detectives as they try to uncover that secret. It is a journey that has seen the land of Italy lifted out of the sea, squashed and folded, torn apart, left high and dry when the Mediterranean Sea evaporated away, and then flooded when the Atlantic waters poured back in. The story of the Earth's history is fascinating in its own right, but with Alvarez as the tour guide, the journey takes on a human dimension, full of stories about the landscape and history of Italy and about the great geologists who uncovered the deep past of this land. It is a journey recounted in warm tones and subtle colors, reflecting the transcendent beauty of Italy itself.
Download or read book Fire in the Sky written by Gordon L. Dillow and published by Scribner. This book was released on 2020-08-04 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This “accessible and always entertaining” (Booklist) combination of history, pop science, and in-depth reporting offers a fascinating account of the asteroids that hit Earth long ago and those streaming toward us now, as well as how prepared we are against asteroid-caused catastrophe. One of these days, warns Gordon Dillow, the Earth will be hit by a comet or asteroid of potentially catastrophic size. The only question is when. In the meantime, we need to get much better at finding objects hurtling our way, and if they’re large enough to penetrate the atmosphere without burning up, figure out what to do about them. We owe many of science’s most important discoveries to the famed Meteor Crater, a mile-wide dimple on the Colorado Plateau created by an asteroid hit 50,000 years ago. In his masterfully researched Fire in the Sky, Dillow unpacks what the Crater has to tell us. Prior to the early 1900s, the world believed that all craters—on the Earth and Moon—were formed by volcanic activity. Not so. The revelation that Meteor Crater and others like it were formed by impacts with space objects has led to a now accepted theory about what killed off the dinosaurs, and it has opened up a new field of asteroid observation that is brimming with urgency. Dillow looks at great asteroid hits of the past and modern-day asteroid hunters and defense planning experts, including America’s first Planetary Defense Officer. Satellite sensors confirm that a Hiroshima-scale blast occurs in the atmosphere every year, and a smaller, one-kiloton blast every month. While Dillow makes clear that the objects above can be deadly, he consistently inspires awe with his descriptions of their size, makeup, and origins. Both a riveting work of popular science and a warning to not take for granted the space objects hurtling overhead, Fire in the Sky is, ultimately, a testament to our universe’s celestial wonders.
Download or read book Chicanx Utopias written by Luis Alvarez and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2022-02-22 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Amid the rise of neoliberalism, globalization, and movements for civil rights and global justice in the post–World War II era, Chicanxs in film, music, television, and art weaponized culture to combat often oppressive economic and political conditions. They envisioned utopias that, even if never fully realized, reimagined the world and linked seemingly disparate people and places. In the latter half of the twentieth century, Chicanx popular culture forged a politics of the possible and gave rise to utopian dreams that sprang from everyday experiences. In Chicanx Utopias, Luis Alvarez offers a broad study of these utopian visions from the 1950s to the 2000s. Probing the film Salt of the Earth, brown-eyed soul music, sitcoms, poster art, and borderlands reggae music, he examines how Chicanx pop culture, capable of both liberation and exploitation, fostered interracial and transnational identities, engaged social movements, and produced varied utopian visions with divergent possibilities and limits. Grounded in the theoretical frameworks of Walter Benjamin, Stuart Hall, and the Zapatista movement, this book reveals how Chicanxs articulated pop cultural utopias to make sense of, challenge, and improve the worlds they inhabited.
Download or read book Luis Walter Alvarez June 13 1911 September 1 1988 written by W. Peter Trower and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 7 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Sixth Extinction written by Elizabeth Kolbert and published by Henry Holt and Company. This book was released on 2014-02-11 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR A major book about the future of the world, blending intellectual and natural history and field reporting into a powerful account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes Over the last half a billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Scientists around the world are currently monitoring the sixth extinction, predicted to be the most devastating extinction event since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. This time around, the cataclysm is us. In The Sixth Extinction, two-time winner of the National Magazine Award and New Yorker writer Elizabeth Kolbert draws on the work of scores of researchers in half a dozen disciplines, accompanying many of them into the field: geologists who study deep ocean cores, botanists who follow the tree line as it climbs up the Andes, marine biologists who dive off the Great Barrier Reef. She introduces us to a dozen species, some already gone, others facing extinction, including the Panamian golden frog, staghorn coral, the great auk, and the Sumatran rhino. Through these stories, Kolbert provides a moving account of the disappearances occurring all around us and traces the evolution of extinction as concept, from its first articulation by Georges Cuvier in revolutionary Paris up through the present day. The sixth extinction is likely to be mankind's most lasting legacy; as Kolbert observes, it compels us to rethink the fundamental question of what it means to be human.
Download or read book Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs written by Lisa Randall and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2015-10-27 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this brilliant exploration of our cosmic environment, the renowned particle physicist and New York Times bestselling author of Warped Passages and Knocking on Heaven’s Door uses her research into dark matter to illuminate the startling connections between the furthest reaches of space and life here on Earth. Sixty-six million years ago, an object the size of a city descended from space to crash into Earth, creating a devastating cataclysm that killed off the dinosaurs, along with three-quarters of the other species on the planet. What was its origin? In Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs, Lisa Randall proposes it was a comet that was dislodged from its orbit as the Solar System passed through a disk of dark matter embedded in the Milky Way. In a sense, it might have been dark matter that killed the dinosaurs. Working through the background and consequences of this proposal, Randall shares with us the latest findings—established and speculative—regarding the nature and role of dark matter and the origin of the Universe, our galaxy, our Solar System, and life, along with the process by which scientists explore new concepts. In Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs, Randall tells a breathtaking story that weaves together the cosmos’ history and our own, illuminating the deep relationships that are critical to our world and the astonishing beauty inherent in the most familiar things.
