Asteroid Hunters by Carrie Nugent
Simon & Schuster/TED: 3/14/17
digital review copy; 128 pages
ISBN-13: 9781501120084
Asteroid Hunters by Carrie Nugent is a highly recommended quick look at asteroids. This is the published version of a TED talk that would be a good choice for anyone interested in learning more
about asteroids, from as young as age 10 to adult. This book could be
the foundational inspiration for future asteroid hunters/researchers.
Nugent provides her information about asteroids in accessible easy to
comprehend language. She covers what they are and where they come from,
but also the bigger question: what would happen if one hit the Earth? We
know they have hit the Earth in the past and many adults remember
Shoemaker Levy 9 hitting Jupiter. Elementary school children will know
that a meteorite was responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs. I think
most people who are interested in asteroids will remember the meteor
that exploded over Chelyabinsk
in Russia on February 15, 2013. There were numerous videos available
online and they can still be found today with a quick search.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpmXyJrs7iU)
Nugent discusses the different telescopes used to find asteroids,
including the infrared NEOWISE, the project on which she is working.
"The successful hunt and mapping of asteroids
could mean nothing less than saving life on earth." Most asteroids live
in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and stay in a stable
orbit. Why scientists are busy identifying those asteroids, they are
also looking at any whose orbit takes them close to Earth. By the end of
2011, scientists had found "over 90 percent of asteroids bigger than
one kilometer across that get close to Earth" and since then even more
have been found. Asteroid hunters are continually searching for even
smaller, but still potentially destructive asteroids.
This is a short, easy to read and follow look at Nugent's job as an
asteroid hunter. As someone who has spent more than one night watching
the sky during meteor showers I guess the one drawback for me was the
lack of real pictures in the book. You don't forget seeing a fireball or
an especially active shower. There are illustrations, probably made for
the TED talk, but it would be nice to see some real photographs. This
is especially true of some big events that I recall being in awe over -
Shoemaker Levy 9 hitting Jupiter and the Chelyabinsk, Russia meteor.
No comments:
Post a Comment