Summary
Tells the incredible story of how astronomers solved one of the most compelling mysteries in science and, along the way, introduces readers to fundamental concepts and cutting-edge advances in modern astronomy.--From publisher description. Full description
- Introduction : 13.7 billion years
- pt. 1. The age of objects in our solar system
- 4004 BCE
- Moon rocks and meteorites
- Defying gravity
- pt. 2. The ages of the oldest stars
- Stepping out
- Distances and light
- All stars are not the same
- Giant and dwarf stars
- Reading a Hertzsprung-Russell (H-R) diagram
- Mass
- Star clusters
- Mass matters
- White dwarfs and the age of the universe
- Ages of globular clusters and the age of the universe
- pt. 3. The age of the universe
- Cepheids
- An irregular system of globular clusters
- The Milky Way demoted
- The trouble with gravity
- The expanding universe
- The Hubble age of the universe
- The accelerating universe
- Dark matter
- Exotic dark matter
- Hot stuff
- Two kinds of trouble
- The WMAP map of the CMB and the age of the universe
- A consistent answer.