Research Catalog

Title

The formation of the solar system : theories old and new / Michael Woolfson.

Author

Woolfson, Michael M. (Michael Mark)

Publication

London : Imperial College Press ; Hackensack, NJ : Distributed by World Scientific Pub. Co., c2007.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xxii, 318 p. : ill. (some col.); 24 cm.

Summary

"This book traces the development of ideas about the origin of the Solar System from ancient times to the present day. A survey of more modern ideas, covering the last 200 years or so, highlights the difficulties experienced by theories and also points the way towards the development of a more successful theory. In particular, the current "standard model" - the Solar Nebula Theory - is examined and discussed in some detail. After more than thirty years of development, this theory has still not settled down into an agreed form, as it experiences both theoretical difficulties and problems with reconciling new observations. By contrast, the Capture Theory, developed over the last forty years by the author, and supported by recent observations provides a complete description of the formation of the Solar System, including an evolutionary hypothesis that explains the detailed structure of the system. Written in an informative yet accessible manner, this book will appeal to both specialist and non-specialist readers alike."--BOOK JACKET.

Subject

• Solar system
• Solar system > Origin

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 305-311) and index.

Contents

ch. 1. Theories come and theories go -- ch. 2. Measuring atoms and the universe -- ch. 3. Greek offerings -- ch. 4. The shoulders of giants -- ch. 5. A voyage of discovery to the solar system -- ch. 6. The problem to be solved -- ch. 7. The French connection -- ch. 8. American Catherine-Wheels -- ch. 9. British big tides -- ch. 10. Russian could capture-with British help -- ch. 11. German vortices-with a little French help -- ch. 12. McCrea's floccules -- ch. 13. What earlier theories indicate -- ch. 14. Disks around new stars -- ch. 15. Planets around other stars -- ch. 16. Disks around older stars -- ch. 17. What a theory should explain now -- ch. 18. The new Solar Nebula theory: the angular momentum problem -- ch. 19. Making planets top-down -- ch. 20. A bottom-up alternative -- ch. 21. Making planets faster -- ch. 22. Wandering planets -- ch. 23. Back to top-down -- ch. 24. This is the stuff that stars are made of -- ch. 25. Making dense cool clouds -- ch. 26. A star is born -- ch. 27. Close to the maddening crowd -- ch. 28. Close encounters of the stellar kind -- ch. 29. Ever decreasing circles -- ch. 30. How many planetary systems? -- ch. 31. Starting a family -- ch. 32. Tilting-but not as windmills -- ch. 33. The terrestrial planets raise problems! -- ch. 34. A British Bang theory: the earth and Venus -- ch. 35. Behold the wandering moon -- ch. 36. Fleet Mercury and warlike Mars -- ch. 37. Gods of the sea and the nether regions -- ch. 38. Bits and pieces -- ch. 39. Comets-the harbingers of doom! -- ch. 40. Making atoms with a biggish bang -- ch. 41. Is the capture theory valid?

ISBN

• 9781860948244 (hbk.)
• 1860948243 (hbk.)

LCCN

^^2008295962

OCLC

• 171560875
• SCSB-9997424

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library