How do three celestial bodies move under their mutual gravitational attraction? This problem has been studied by Isaac Newton and leading mathematicians over the last two centuries. Poincaré's conclusion, that the problem represents an example of chaos in nature, opens the new possibility of using a statistical approach. For the first time this book presents these methods in a systematic way, surveying statistical as well as more traditional methods. This book should be essential reading for students in a rapidly expanding field and is suitable for students of celestial mechanics at advanced undergraduate and graduate level.

The Three-Body Problem

Science & Math

Valtonen, Mauri

Karttunen, Hannu

Astronomy & Space Science

Cambridge University Press

Sir Isaac Newton famously said, regarding his discoveries, "If I have seen further it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants." The Evolving Universe and the Origin of Life describes, complete with fascinating biographical details of the thinkers involved, the ascent to the metaphorical shoulders accomplished by the greatest minds in history. For the first time, a single book can take the reader on a journey through the history of the universe as interpreted by the expanding body of knowledge of humankind. From subatomic particles to the protein chains that form life, and expanding in scale to the entire universe, this book covers the science that explains how we came to be. The Evolving Universe and the Origin of Life contains a great breadth of knowledge, from astronomy to physics, from chemistry to biology. It includes over 350 figures that enhance the comprehension of concepts both basic and advanced, and is a non-technical, easy-to-read text at an introductory college level that is ideal for anyone interested in science as well as its history.

The Evolving Universe and the Origin of Life: The Search for Our Cosmic Roots

Teerikorpi, Pekka

Lehto, K.

Lehto, Harry

Byrd, Gene

Chernin, Arthur

Springer

About the Author Pekka Teerikorpi defended his doctoral thesis at the University of Turku (1981), where he worked after that at teaching and research positions (now retired, but affiliated as adjunct professor). He has studied extragalactic astronomy and cosmology, especially questions related to the cosmic distance scale, the expansion rate of the universe (the Hubble constant) and dark energy. He has also researched interstellar dust, the rotation of the Milky Way and active galactic nuclei. He is a coauthor of the books Discovery of Cosmic Fractals (World Scientific 2002), The Evolving Universe and the Origin of Life (Springer 2009) Fundamental Questions of Practical Cosmology (Springer 2012), and Paths to Dark Energy (De Gruyer 2012). Additionally, he has written several books in Finnish about the history and spirit of astronomy. Gene Byrd (B.S Texas A&M University 1968; PhD 1974 from the Univ. of Texas) is a Professor of Astronomy (emeritus) at the University of Alabama. His career has been a mixture of teaching, research and service. He is a University of Alabama College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Teaching Fellow and has published texts and research on teaching. He studies the theory and observations of the dynamics of galaxies, discovering the pattern in NGC4622, which, counterintuitively, has inner and outer spiral arms winding in opposite directions. Dr. Byrd served as Secretary and Chair of the American Astronomical Society’s Division on Dynamical Astronomy. He is authored over 100 articles and books, including a senior/graduate level text, Paths to Dark Energy: Theory and Observation (De Gryuter 2012), along with articles on teaching and the history of astronomy.Arthur D. Chernin graduated from Leningrad Polytechnic Instutute in 1963. He got his PhD in 1969 from Ioffe PhysTech Institute and Dr Sci in 1979 from Pulkovo Observatory in astrophysics. He joined Theory Department of Ioffe institute (1963-1981), became professor in Department of Physics and Astronomy at the Hertsen University of Leningrad (1981-1990) and then Sternberg Astronomy Institute of Moscow State University. He has collaborated with his coauthors on cosmological topics such as dark matter, dark energy, andgalaxy formation. Dr. Chernin is a coauthor of the books Alexander A. Friedmann: The Man who made the Universe expand (Cambridge UP 2006), Cosmology (URSS, Moscow 2007), The Evolving Universe and the Origin of Life (Springer 2009), Paths to Dark Energy (De Gruyter 2012) as well as a number of books in the Russian language.Harry Lehto got his MSc in Astronomy at the Univ. of Turku, at the faculty of Mathematics and Natural Science, in 1982, and his PhD at the Univ. of Virginia, Charlottesville, Dept. of Astronomy, in 1989. After his degree he worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Oxford and University of Sourhampton, UK, and since 1991, at the University of Turku, Tuorla Observatory, Dept of Physics and Astronomy, in various teaching and research positions. He was the director of the observatory from 2010 to 2013. His career has covered observations from X-rays to radio waves, and included analysis of time series in nearly all of his work. The work has covered quasars, magnetic cataclysmic variable stars and dynamical studies of planetary systems. He has a long and profound interest in nature. He took part in the Rosetta mission studying the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko with the COSIMA instrument in search of elements and molecules important for prebiotic evolution. Since the early 2000’s, he has been teaching courses on Astrobiology and has also written multiple scientific and popular articles on this field.Kirsi Lehto got her MSc at the Univ. of Helsinki, faculty of Agriculture, in 1981, and her PhD at the Univ. of California, Riverside, Dept. of Plant Pathology, in 1989. After her degree she worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Imperial College, London, and since 2001, at the University of Turku, at the

Lehto, Kirsi

This work provides the current theory and observations behind the cosmological phenomenon of dark energy. The approach is comprehensive with rigorous mathematical theory and relevant astronomical observations discussed in context. The book treats the background and history starting with the new-found importance of Einstein´s cosmological constant (proposed long ago for the opposite purpose) in dark energy formulation, as well as the frontiers of dark energy.

Paths to Dark Energy: Theory and Observation (De Gruyter Studies in Mathematical Physics, 2)

Chernin, Arthur D.

Walter de Gruyter

This book, written for a general readership, reviews and explains the three-body problem in historical context reaching to latest developments in computational physics and gravitation theory. The three-body problem is one of the oldest problems in science and it is most relevant even in today’s physics and astronomy.
The long history of the problem from Pythagoras to Hawking parallels the evolution of ideas about our physical universe, with a particular emphasis on understanding gravity and how it operates between astronomical bodies. The oldest astronomical three-body problem is the question how and when the moon and the sun line up with the earth to produce eclipses. Once the universal gravitation was discovered by Newton, it became immediately a problem to understand why these three-bodies form a stable system, in spite of the pull exerted from one to the other. In fact, it was a big question whether this system is stable at all in the long run.
Leading mathematicians attacked this problem over more than two centuries without arriving at a definite answer. The introduction of computers in the last half-a-century has revolutionized the study; now many answers have been found while new questions about the three-body problem have sprung up. One of the most recent developments has been in the treatment of the problem in Einstein’s General Relativity, the new theory of gravitation which is an improvement on Newton’s theory. Now it is possible to solve the problem for three black holes and to test one of the most fundamental theorems of black hole physics, the no-hair theorem, due to Hawking and his co-workers.

The Three-body Problem from Pythagoras to Hawking

Anosova, Joanna

Kholshevnikov, Konstantin

Mylläri, Aleksandr

Orlov, Victor

Tanikawa, Kiyotaka

Reference

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Valtonen, Mauri. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Valtonen, Mauri