Sun and Earth Author:Herbert Friedman How do storms on the sun make the spectacular northern lights? How steady is the flow of energy from the sun that reaches and nourishes the earth? How can the most subtle, slow variations in solar flux cause the coming and goings of great ice ages? — Not until Einstein formulated the thermonuclear conversion of mass into energy were such question... more »s answered, thus ending the debate over whether or not the sun burns like a mass of coal. Since then, insights into the dynamic relation between sun and earth have increased greatly with each decade of achievement in space exploration.
Written for the general reader by the internationally renowned space scientist Herbert Friedman, 'Sun and Earth' captures the drama and excitement of sun-earth studies. It combines a historical narrative of scientific progress from Galileo to the space shuttle with interpretive accounts that retain the awe and wonder with which pre-twentieth-century scientists--and poets--regarded the inescapable fact of the suns life-bestowing characteristics. It provides a comprehensive picture of how the sun shapes our environment and explains the impact of solar variability on the contemporary problems of radio communications, the survival of astronauts and spacecraft in the earths orbit, and the increasingly precarious existence of life on the earth.« less