Science - Earth & Physical

A wonderful journey through time, along the waves of our planet's most significant ocean, in an irresistible blend of gripping history, fascinating science and exhilarating reportage.

We all come from different cultures and practice different spiritual traditions, but we have one thing in common: we are all of the earth. Vanessa Chakour, founder of the rewilding programme Sacred Warrior, takes us on a journey to deepen our relationship with ourselves and the environment. Awakening Artemis is her love letter to the earth.

Sharing her personal journey of rewilding, her stories act as tools, both practical and inspirational, to encourage growth, healing and reconnection to the regenerative power of the natural world. Vanessa will help you embrace the strength and beauty in the wild, the weeds, and the unsavoury parts of yourself in order to grow and heal. By allowing yourself and the earth to flourish and awakening your inner Artemis, Chakour promises that you will find joy, peace, compassion for yourself, others, and the planet.

What came before the Big Bang, and what exists outside of the universe it created?

Until recently, scientists could only guess at what lay past the edge of spacetime. But as pioneering theoretical physicist Laura Mersini-Houghton explains, today new scientific tools are giving us the ability to peer beyond the limits of our universe and test our theories about what is there. Her groundbreaking research suggests that we sit in a quantum landscape whose peaks and valleys hide a multitude of other universes, and whose topography holds the secret to the origins of existence itself. Recent evidence has revealed the signatures of one such sibling universe in our own night sky, confirming Mersini-Houghton's theoretical work and offering humbling proof that our universe is just one member of an unending cosmic family.

A mind-expanding journey through the multiverse, Beyond the Big Bang will reshape our understanding of humanity's place in the unfathomable vastness of the cosmos.

All of the Earth's ocean, from the equator to the poles, is a single engine powered by sunlight - a blue machine. In a book that will recalibrate our view of this defining feature of our planet, physicist Helen Czerski dives deep to illuminate the murky depths of the ocean engine, examining the messengers, passengers and voyagers that live in it, travel over it, and survive because of it.

From the ancient Polynesians who navigated the Pacific by reading the waves to permanent residents of the deep such as the Greenland shark that can live for hundreds of years, she explains the vast currents, invisible ocean walls and underwater waterfalls that all have their place in the ocean's complex, interlinked system. Timely, elegant and passionately argued, The Blue Machine is one of the biggest stories ever told. The understanding it offers is crucial to our future. Drawing on years of experience at the forefront of marine science, Helen Czerski captures the magnitude and subtlety of this complex force, showing us the thrilling extent to which we are at the mercy of this great engine.

Stephen Hawking, the world-famous cosmologist and bestselling author of A Brief History of Time (2694), leaves us with his final thoughts on the universe's biggest questions in this brilliant posthumous work. As we face potentially catastrophic changes here on Earth, this is his personal view on the challenges we face as a human race, and where we, as a planet, are heading next.

Was there a beginning of time? Could time run backwards? Is the universe infinite or does it have boundaries? These are just some of the questions considered in this internationally acclaimed masterpiece by one of the world's greatest thinkers.

The author has travelled the globe in search of the oddities of nature, prized so highly for jewellery and adornment. And why, when we can now manufacture synthetic gems, do jewels still hold such appeal?

A dazzling scientific detective story from the ecologist who first discovered the hidden language of trees. No one has done more to transform our understanding of trees than the world-renowned scientist Suzanne Simard. Now she shares the secrets of a lifetime spent uncovering startling truths about trees: their cooperation, healing capacity, memory, wisdom and sentience.

Raised in the forests of British Columbia, where her family has lived for generations, Professor Simard did not set out to be a scientist. She was working in the forest service when she first discovered how trees communicate underground through an immense web of fungi, at the centre of which lie the Mother Trees: the mysterious, powerful entities that nurture their kin and sustain the forest. Though her ground-breaking findings were initially dismissed and even ridiculed, they are now firmly supported by the data. As her remarkable journey shows us, science is not a realm apart from ordinary life, but deeply connected with our humanity.

We tend to think of Earth volcanoes as erupting hot, molten lava. However, it isn't necessarily the same across the rest of the Solar System. For a start, some volcanoes aren't even particularly hot. Those on Pluto, for example, erupt an icy slush of substances that freeze to form ice mountains. While others erupt the hottest lavas in the Solar System onto a surface covered in a frosty coating of sulphur.

Fire and Ice is an exploration of the Solar System's volcanoes, from the highest peaks of Mars to the intensely inhospitable surface of Venus and the red-hot summits of Io, to the coldest, seemingly dormant icy carapaces of Enceladus and Europa, an unusual look at how these cosmic features are made, and whether such active planetary systems might host life.

From the immensity of the universe and the roundness of Earth, to the form of every single snowflake, the forces of nature shape everything we see. Here, Professor Brian Cox uncovers some of the most extraordinary natural events on Earth and in the universe and beyond.

In the mid-nineteenth century, a group of remarkable women were employed by Harvard College Observatory as ‘Human Computers’ to interpret the observations made by their male counterparts. Enriched by excerpts from letters, diaries, and memoirs, Dava Sobel shines a light on the hidden history of these extraordinary women, who changed the burgeoning field of astronomy and our understanding of the stars and our place in the universe.

This is the story of a quest: to find a Theory of Everything. Einstein dedicated his life to seeking this elusive Holy Grail, a single, revolutionary 'god equation' which would tie all the forces in the universe together, yet never found it. Some of the greatest minds in physics took up the search, from Stephen Hawking to Brian Greene. None have yet succeeded. In The God Equation, renowned theoretical physicist Michio Kaku takes the reader on a mind-bending ride through the twists and turns of this epic journey: a mystery that has fascinated him for most of his life.

He guides us through the key debates in modern physics, from Newton's law of gravity via relativity and quantum mechanics to the latest developments in string theory. It is a tale of dazzling breakthroughs and crushing dead ends, illuminated by Kaku's clarity, storytelling flair and infectious enthusiasm. The object of the quest is now within sight: we are closer than ever to achieving the most ambitious undertaking in the history of science. If successful, the Theory of Everything could simultaneously unlock the deepest mysteries of space and time, and fulfil that most ancient and basic of human desires - to understand the meaning of our lives.

Ranulph Fiennes, the world's greatest living explorer, has travelled to some of the most remote, dangerous parts of the globe. Well-known for his experiences at the poles and climbing Everest, he has also endured some of the hottest conditions on the planet, where temperatures regularly exceed 40 degrees and, without water and shelter, death is inevitable.

In June 1925, twenty-three-year-old Werner Heisenberg, suffering from hay fever, retreated to a small, treeless island in the North Sea called Helgoland. It was there that he came up with one of the most transformative scientific concepts: quantum theory. Almost a century later, quantum physics has given us many startling ideas: ghost waves, distant objects that seem magically connected to each other, cats that are both dead and alive. Countless experiments have led to practical applications that shape our daily lives. Today our understanding of the world around us is based on this theory. And yet it is still profoundly mysterious.

In this enchanting book, Carlo Rovelli, one of our most celebrated scientists, tells the extraordinary story of quantum physics and reveals its deep meaning: a world made of substances is replaced by a world made of relations, each particle responding to another in a never ending game of mirrors. Shifting our perspective once again, Rovelli takes us on a riveting journey through the universe so we can better understand our place in it.

Professor Brian Cox and Robin Ince take the musings of the great and the good of British science, producing an insight into the multifaceted subjects involved in building a Universe. They tackle everything from the Big Bang to parallel Universes, fierce creatures to extra-terrestrial life, and brain science to artificial intelligence.

Where are we? Are we alone? Who are we? Why are we here? What is our future? Professor Brian Cox tackles some of the greatest questions that humans have asked to try and understand the very nature of ourselves and the Universe in which we live.

Imagination and creativity are at the root of every uniquely human achievement and those achievements have brought us to this present moment.

We are now the largest population in human history: seven and half billion people, rising to nine billion by 2050. Our technologies are evolving exponentially, but spiritually and emotionally, we're not keeping pace. Our
appetites are straining the earth's capacity to sustain us, and our attempts to force it to do so are fuelling a holocaust of other species. Communities across the globe are still locked in ancient cultural conflicts, and while the majority of people are materially more comfortable than ever before, there are global epidemics of depression and anxiety.

To meet these existential challenges, we have to harness our creativity to a more compassionate and sustainable vision of the world we want to live in and the lives we hope to lead. To do that, we have to create new systems of education for the future and for our children that are based on organic principles of diversity, creativity, and collaboration.

The world is shaped by complexity. In this enlightening book, Nobel Prize winner Giorgio Parisi guides us through his unorthodox yet exhilarating work to show us how. It all starts with investigating the principles of physics by observing the sophisticated flight patterns of starlings. Studying the movements of these birds, he has realized, proves an illuminating way into understanding complex systems of all kinds - collections of everything from atoms to planets to other animals like ourselves.

Along the way, Parisi reflects on the lessons he's taken from a life in pursuit of scientific truth: the importance of serendipity to the discovery of new ideas, the surprising kinship between physics and other fields of study and the value of science to a thriving society. In so doing, he removes the practice of science from the confines of the laboratory and into the real world. Complexity is all around us - from climate to finance to biology, it offers a unique way of finding order in chaos. Part elegant scientific treatise, part thrilling intellectual journey, In a Flight of Starlings is an invitation to find wonder in the world around us.

Eclectic, erudite and entertaining, In Our Time is one of Radio 4's most successful programmes, regularly attracting an audience of over 2 million for its discussions on every subject under the sun: from oceanography to Ovid. In this special themed collection, Melvyn Bragg is joined by guest experts including Simon Schaffer, John Gribbin, Jim Al-Khalili and Sir Martin Rees to discuss 25 of the key laws, principles and problems of physics.

Here are examinations of major concepts including plasma, radiation, matter and antimatter and the Second Law of Thermodynamics, as well as discourses on historical theories such as Zeno's paradoxes, the speed of light and relativity. Also featured are analyses of modern developments in physics, including the discovery and growing understanding of the proton, neutron and electron, the controversial breakthrough of nuclear technology, and the search for the holy grail of 20th century physics: the Grand Unified Theory. 

Four more series of the multi-award-winning science/comedy show Celebrating the wonders of the universe since 2009 The Infinite Monkey Cage combines wit and wisdom to explore scientific concepts in an entertaining accessible way.

In these four series physicist Brian Cox and comedian Robin Ince are back to 'put a smile on the face of science' (The Independent). They're joined by a wealth of boffins brainiacs and celebrity science enthusiasts all keen to share their hard facts soft theories and bold comic deviations.

Beginning with the end of the universe they tackle topics including black holes the human brain Neanderthals and the science of cooking - and attempt to answer profound philosophical questions such as 'What is life and how did it start?' 'Is time an illusion?' and ''What is reality?'

There's also an astronaut's guide to isolation featuring Helen Sharman Chris Hadfield Nicole Stott and Apollo 9's Rusty Schweickart; a look back at 60 years of chimpanzee research with Jane Goodall; and a history of rock (not in the Rolling Stones sense but actual rolling stones).

Plus the duo play Animal Top Trumps to find out whether we should prefer beautiful bats to much-maligned flies; travel deep below the ocean waves to see what lies beneath; discover how trees communicate using the Wood Wide Web; and learn why two brains are definitely better than one...

Among their special guests are Eric Idle Steve Martin Matt Lucas Tim Minchin Bill Bailey Mark Gatiss Steve Jones Ross Noble Sara Pascoe Prof Alice Roberts Carlo Rovelli Harold McGee Dr Janna Levin Dave Gorman Brendan Hunt and Katy Brand.

William Smith had a passion for rocks and fossils and single-handedly mapped the geology of Great Britain, making him one of the most significant men of the nineteenth century. His map fundamentally changed the way we look at the world but his vision eventually ruined his life.

Sand, salt, iron, copper, oil and lithium. They built our world, and they will transform our future. These are the six most crucial substances in human history. They took us from the Dark Ages to the present day. They power our computers and phones, build our homes and offices, and create life-saving medicines. But most of us take them completely for granted. In Material World, Ed Conway travels the globe - from the sweltering depths of the deepest mine in Europe, to spotless silicon chip factories in Taiwan, to the eerie green pools where lithium originates - to uncover a secret world we rarely see.

Revealing the true marvel of these substances, he follows the mind-boggling journeys, miraculous processes and little-known companies that turn the raw materials we all need into products of astonishing complexity. As we wrestle with climate change, energy crises and the threat of new global conflict, Conway shows why these substances matter more than ever before, and how the hidden battle to control them will shape our geopolitical future. This is the story of civilisation - our ambitions and glory, innovations and appetites - from a new perspective: literally from the ground up.

Before 1856 coloured dyes were derived from natural substances making dyeing an expensive process. Whilst researching how to make artificial quinine, William Perkin discovered a colour, Mauve, and a way to mass-produce colour in a factory.

Histories of science in the 20th century have focused on relativity and quantum mechanics. But, quietly in the background, there has been a third area of exploration which has equally important implications for our understanding of the universe - it is the study of plasma.

Plasma is fourth state of matter and the other three - gas, liquid and solids - emerge out of plasma. This book will reveal how over 99% of the universe is made of plasma and how there are two gigantic clouds of plasma hovering between the Earth and the Moon.

Bestselling author Robert Temple has been following the study of plasma for decades and has worked with several of the senior scientists - including Nobel laureates - at its forefront, including Paul Dirac, David Bohm, Peter Mitchell and Chandra Wickramasinghe.

Buzz Aldrin is the best known of a generation of astronauts whose achievements surged in just a few years from first man in space to first men on the moon. An impassioned advocate for space exploration, he pauses to reflect and share what he has learned, from the vantage point not only of outer space but also of time.

The fascinating and moving story of Kristian Birkeland, an early twentieth century scientist. At the expense of love and happiness, he worked tirelessly to solve the enigma of the Northern Lights.

A dazzlingly original, lyrical and epic encounter with the Earth as it used to be

What would it be like to visit the ancient landscapes of the past? To experience the Jurassic or Cambrian worlds, to wander among these other lands, as creatures extinct for millions of years roam? In this mesmerizing debut, the award-winning palaeontologist Thomas Halliday gives us a breath-taking up close encounter with worlds that are normally unimaginably distant.

Journeying backwards in time from the most recent Ice Age to the dawn of complex life itself, and across all seven continents, Halliday immerses us in a series of extinct ecosystems, each one rendered with a novelist's eye for detail and drama. Yet every description - whether the colour of a beetle's shell, the rhythm of pterosaurs in flight or the lingering smell of sulphur in the air - is grounded in fact. We visit the birthplace of humanity in Pliocene-era Kenya; in the Jurassic, we wander among dinosaur-inhabited islands in the Mediterranean; and we gaze at the light of an enormous moon in the Ediacaran sky, when life hasn't yet reached land.

Otherlands is a naturalist's travel guide, albeit one of lands distant in time rather than space, showing us the last 500 million years not as an endless expanse of unfathomable time, but as a series of worlds, simultaneously fantastical and familiar.

Sean Carroll reveals the history-making forces of insight, rivalry, and wonder that fuelled the Higgs search and how its discovery opens a door to the mind-boggling domain of dark matter and other phenomena we never predicted. Told with unrivalled ambition, authority, and access to the teams, this is the greatest science story of our time.

Patrick Moore first became interested in astronomy as a schoolboy, and is still just as keen. For over 45 years he presented the BBC's programme 'The Sky At Night', where his personality and enthusiasm made him a household name. At 80 years of age he is still working to raise the profile of science and astronomy among the British public.

Andrew Cohen and Professor Brian Cox take us on a voyage of discovery, from the fiery heart of our Solar System, to its mysterious outer reaches. They touch on the latest discoveries that have expanded our knowledge of the planets, their moons and how they come to be. Along the way we will meet all eight of the major planets, and a mysterious as yet unseen world way out beyond the Kuiper belt....

The runaway success of the microchip processor may be nearing its end, with profound implications for our economy, society and way of life, even leaving Silicon Valley as a new Rust Belt, its technology obsolete. Step forward the quantum computer, which harnesses the power and complexity of the atomic realm, and may be useful in solving humanity's greatest challenges from climate change, to global starvation, to incurable diseases. Humanity's next great technological achievement already promises to be every bit as revolutionary as the transistor and microchip once were. Its unprecedented gains in computing power and unique ability to simulate the physical universe herald advances that could change every aspect of our lives. Corporations and whole nations are betting on quantum computing, hoping to exploit its power to design more efficient vehicles, create life-saving new drugs and streamline industries to revolutionize the economy.

But this is only the beginning. Quantum computers could allow us to finally create nuclear fusion reactors that produce clean, renewable energy without radioactive waste or threats of meltdown. They could help us crack the biological processes that generate natural, cheap fertilizer and enable us to feed the world's growing populations. And they could unravel the fiendishly difficult protein folding that lies at the heart of previously incurable diseases such as Alzheimer's, motor neurone disease and Parkinson's, helping us to live longer, healthier lives. Told with Kaku's signature clarity and enthusiasm, Quantum Supremacy is the story of this exciting frontier and the race to claim humanity's future.

Marcus Chown reveals the wonders of modern physics - and explains why the faster you travel, the slimmer you get.

Of all weathers, snow is the one that has always affected Marcus Sedgwick the most. A few years ago he bought a mountain home, an old chalet high in the Haute Savoie, and for the first time he began to understand what it is to live in an environment where extreme snowfall is frequent.

Every atom of our bodies has been part of a star. Our very own star, the Sun, is crucial to the development and sustainability of life on Earth. This Very Short Introduction presents a modern, authoritative examination of how stars live.

Stephen Hawking is one of the most remarkable figures of our time. A Cambridge genius who has earned international celebrity and become an inspiration to those who have witnessed his triumph over disability. This is Hawking's life story by Kitty Ferguson, written with help from Hawking himself and his close associates.

Helen Czerski links the little things we see every day with the big world we live in. Each chapter begins with something small – popcorn, coffee stains and refrigerator magnets – and uses it to explain some of the most important science and technology of our time.