The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It by Robert Zimmerman (PDF)

Description

The Hubble Space Telescope has produced the most stunning images of the cosmos humanity has ever seen. It has transformed our understanding of the universe around us, revealing new information about its age and evolution, the life cycle of stars, and the very existence of black holes, among other startling discoveries. But it took an amazing amount of work and perseverance to get the first space telescope up and running. The Universe in a Mirror tells the story of this telescope and the visionaries responsible for its extraordinary accomplishments. Robert Zimmerman takes readers behind the scenes of one of the most ambitious scientific instruments ever sent into space. After World War II, astronomer Lyman Spitzer and a handful of scientists waged a fifty-year struggle to build the first space telescope capable of seeing beyond Earth’s atmospheric veil. Zimmerman shows how many of the telescope’s advocates sacrificed careers and family to get it launched, and how others devoted their lives to Hubble only to have their hopes and reputations shattered when its mirror was found to be flawed. This is the story of an idea that would not die–and of the dauntless human spirit. Illustrated with striking color images, The Universe in a Mirror describes the heated battles between scientists and bureaucrats, the perseverance of astronauts to repair and maintain the telescope, and much more. Hubble, and the men and women behind it, opened a rare window onto the universe, dazzling humanity with sights never before seen. This book tells their remarkable story. A new afterword updates the reader on the May 2009 Hubble service mission and looks to the future of astronomy, including the prospect of a new space telescope to replace Hubble.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “One of Booklist’s Editors’ Choice for Best Adult Titles for 2008″”Finalist for the 2008 Eugene M. Emme Astronautical Literature Award, American Astronautical Society””The Universe in a Mirror . . . [is] a breezy behind-the-scenes account by Robert Zimmerman, a freelance writer and space historian. . . . Mr. Zimmerman has brought the story up to the present, and it’s a great story.”—Dennis Overbye, New York Times”Zimmerman vividly describes the building of the telescope, the turf wars among bureaucrats, scientists and congressional staffers, and the trials and tribulations of the Hubble itself once it was launched. . . . [A] page-turner full of human drama.”—Glenn Harlan Reynolds, Wall Street Journal”The Hubble project’s struggle not to be strangled by bureaucracy was conveyed last year in a stirring history, and cautionary tale, by Robert Zimmerman–The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It. Worth a read.”—Daniel Henninger, Wall Street Journal”A blow-by-blow account of how the Large Space Telescope, as it was originally called, got built–and a cracking good read it makes. . . . Zimmerman has written an engrossing account of a great story.”—Michael Disney, American Scientist”A fascinating inside look at how the great observatory came to be.”—David Shiga, New Scientist”Must reading for armchair astrophysicists.”—Bryce Christensen, Booklist”The Universe in a Mirror is an epic biography of the Hubble telescope. But perhaps more poignant is the book’s subtle reminder of all that will be lost in just a few years when Hubble falls from its orbit around Earth–and disintegrates.”—Ashley Yeager, Science News”A just-in-time book that provides the reader key details regarding the Hubble Space Telescope (HST)–and why servicing the eye-on-the-universe is so important. . . . Zimmerman has written an excellent book that details the rocky and twisted road that led to the creation of the HST–not only a technological marvel–but an on-orbit instrument that had to overcome a gravity well of politics and bureaucracy.” ― Space Coalition.com”Space historian Robert Zimmerman’s crisp and balanced account of Hubble (based on many oral interviews as well as documents) reminds us not only of Hubble’s battle with adversity, but also of the many scientists and engineers who shepherded the project through good times and bad.”—Laurence A. Marschall, Natural History Magazine”Zimmerman, a science writer and historian of space exploration, brings back to life those long-forgotten scientists and engineers who engaged in a decades-long campaign to bring Hubble to the launch pad.”—Tod R. Lauer, Physics World”Although there are a number of recent books that discuss some of the history and science behind the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), there are no other current works that cover the history behind the HST so extensively. In The Universe in a Mirror, science writer and historian Zimmerman drew from some of the same sources that Smith (The Space Telescope) used, but he dug deeper by using manuscripts, publications, and interviews that other writers did not access. . . . Zimmerman did an excellent job conveying the personalities and the struggles of the people involved. The text of the book flows well, and it is a pretty easy read. Anyone with a basic interest in science would enjoy.”—J.R. Kraus, Choice”Mirror is entrancing. It successfully communicates that astronomy isn’t just a career but something that people do because they’re driven by love, passion, and curiosity. . . . If you love the Hubble, this book is a must-read.”—Pamela L. Gay, Sky & Telescope”The Universe in a Mirror . . . offers a history of the epoch-making telescope, as well as fascinating descriptions of its most enthralling discoveries.”—Bill Gladstone, Canadian Jewish News”It is essentially a popular history, and as that, a very successful work. It is highly readable and enthusiastic without being rhapsodic, and is written from a point of view that reveals a longstanding intimacy with all things Hubble Space Telescope.”—Nasser Zakariya, Endeavor”Robert Zimmerman not only offers more details about the Hubble soap operas that many of know but also provides information about the telescope’s conception, design, construction, and launch that most of us don’t know.” ― Civil Engineering Review “Spectacular images of the cosmos from the Hubble Space Telescope have become so routine that it’s easy to forget the astronomical community’s despair in 1990, when NASA discovered that the main mirror was improperly shaped. In The Universe in a Mirror, Robert Zimmerman brings the visionaries behind this most remarkable of instruments vividly to life, taking us artfully through the decades―long minefield of lobbying, funding, design, construction, delay after the Challenger explosion and launch―and then through the Hubble’s near-death experience as astronomers realized to their horror that its mirror was ground to the wrong shape. His meticulously researched but engaging prose makes it clear how remarkable an achievement the telescope actually was, and how easily it might not have happened at all.”―Michael D. Lemonick, contributing writer to Time and lecturer at Princeton University”For everyone who knows something of the story of the space telescope and its travails, this book provides a fascinating look behind the scenes. An excellent contribution to the history of technology.”―Robert P. Kirshner, author of The Extravagant Universe”Quite a story. I really liked this book.”―John Huchra, Harvard University”Zimmerman demonstrates the importance of vision, perseverance, politics, and good luck in getting this national telescope constructed, fixed, and operated. He also illustrates, somewhat poignantly at times, the human costs and disappointments that came up along the way.”―J. Michael Shull, University of Colorado at Boulder From the Back Cover “Spectacular images of the cosmos from the Hubble Space Telescope have become so routine that it’s easy to forget the astronomical community’s despair in 1990, when NASA discovered that the main mirror was improperly shaped. In The Universe in a Mirror, Robert Zimmerman brings the visionaries behind this most remarkable of instruments vividly to life, taking us artfully through the decades–long minefield of lobbying, funding, design, construction, delay after the Challenger explosion and launch–and then through the Hubble’s near-death experience as astronomers realized to their horror that its mirror was ground to the wrong shape. His meticulously researched but engaging prose makes it clear how remarkable an achievement the telescope actually was, and how easily it might not have happened at all.”–Michael D. Lemonick, contributing writer to Time and lecturer at Princeton University”For everyone who knows something of the story of the space telescope and its travails, this book provides a fascinating look behind the scenes. An excellent contribution to the history of technology.”–Robert P. Kirshner, author of The Extravagant Universe”Quite a story. I really liked this book.”–John Huchra, Harvard University”Zimmerman demonstrates the importance of vision, perseverance, politics, and good luck in getting this national telescope constructed, fixed, and operated. He also illustrates, somewhat poignantly at times, the human costs and disappointments that came up along the way.”–J. Michael Shull, University of Colorado at Boulder About the Author Robert Zimmerman is an award-winning science writer and historian whose work has appeared in Natural History, the Wall Street Journal, and Astronomy, among other leading publications. His books include Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel and Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8. Read more

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐This is a story of a normal thing, something we don’t look at with wonder but simply accept as something that “is.” In that way, the book reminds me of “The Box” by Marc Levinson.The story has an undeniable appeal. The Hubble photographs themselves have universal interest – they are how we show what we know about the universe. More than photographs, Hubble has given us “galactic pin-ups” — super-beautiful photos that are eye-catching and exciting. Our knowledge of and interest in space has expanded enormously because of the Hubble telescope.Hubble has shaped our knowledge and our expectations for science. This book has plenty of photos to augment the story, along with very nice charts and diagrams. The center section is full-color reproductions of Hubble portraits of our solar system, other galaxies, and deep space.The main story line — how Hubble was mis-designed, and how human genius repaired it, is marvelous.And it’s depressing: Most chapters of this book tell the story of a telescope that almost wasn’t. The book is a showcase of getting things done (poorly) through the government: the byzantine decision making, the labyrinths of committee meetings and agendas, the conflicting priorities, the zero-sum nature of bureaucratic planning, the paralysis attendant upon failures. It is utterly dismal how much “science” depends on massaging the government budget process. In America! What a shame.

⭐This book is excellent on the politics, including pictures of the players. And it has a decent section of Hubble color images. But it is curiously lacking on information about the completed instrument. Just a few more pages would have been extremely informative as a complement to the political wrangling. There is no photograph of the completed telescope, either on the ground or as deployed in space. Worse, there are no diagrams that show how it works. And after much discussion of the Vidicon versus CCD battles, we get no confirmation as to the final size of the CCD (was it 2000 x 2000 pixels in an array of four sensors?) and how the light gets from the mirror to the CCD. In an era where digital cameras embodying CCD technolgy are widespread, where many readers are conversant in talking about pixel dimensions of their home images, where many personal cameras have more than 2000 x 2000 pixels, this seems a strange omission. Apologists will say the information can be found elsewhere, but all it would have taken is a handful more pages (10?) to include it here and make the book less skewed to the politics. Even if Zimmerman, as a journalist, didn’t see the need for this, I wonder why an editor didn’t insist on it?

⭐While I am not an astronomer, I am nonetheless addicted to information being revealed by the Hubble Space Telescope. Thus I eagerly looked forward to reading about the history of how it came into existence. Alas, the first half of the book (giving a too detailed account of everyone who touched the project over the approximately two decades before its launch; i.e., the first 118 pages) was deadly. From that point on, however, it was a terrific read. The brilliant men and women who solved the focus issues after the telescope was in orbit and the story of how they did it makes for a fascinating story. It was also very informative and interesting to learn of the political jockeying going on now over whether or not to undertake further NASA maintenance missions to extend Hubble’s life. All in all, I do recommend the book but suggest starting in the middle and skipping the first half.

⭐Zimmerman does a good job keeping the narrative moving, not getting too bogged down into ‘tech talk’ that would bore the amateur. The book is replete with interviews of key people involved in the Hubble project over the years.It is a quick-read and easy to follow. I am just amazed that the Hubble Space Telescope was even launched, finally in 1990. When one reads of the obstacles that had to be overcome one begins to really appreciate how fortunate we are to have the telescope launched, much less still providing fantastic images of the heavens for the past 18 years. Some of the obstacles included lack of funds, politics, technological challenges, bureaucratic egos, other NASA tragedies, and so on.

⭐I was looking for a book that would provide detail information about how the Hubble telescope came to be, without too much stuff about its discoveries and without too many photos – that’s exactly what I received. I wanted answers who designed it, who built it, what happened to its mirror, how they fixed it – and that’s exactly that I’ve learned in details from this book.This is a long history starting with the idea being born in the 1940s, up to the final shuttle service mission, with detailed information about how the instrument was funded, designed, built etc. Author’s style of writing is “readers friendly”, which is good, too.It’s a book for history fans, and it’s a book for reading – not watching pictures. I love it :).

⭐…A well-researched and detailed story of how and why the Hubble Space Telescope came to be, starting with long history of how, why Earth-based telescopes are at a disadvantage (“blind” to much of electromagnetic spectrum, and visible light distorted by atmosphere). Describes the numerous scientists, characters, and the ‘politics’ for justifying cost and development of HST, plusgood explanation and diagrams of why the main mirror was misshapen, and the actions taken to correct its optics. Includes montage of photos taken by HST, some contrasted with fuzzier, blurrier images during pre-HST days.

⭐El autor me atrapó con su libro “adiós a la tierra”, por eso compré la versión kindle de este, pero no me pareció tan bueno, se enfoca más en la burocracia y política que en la parte técnica del telescopio y eso no es lo que estaba buscando.

⭐Not found.

⭐It is commonplace now to see new, amazing images from the Hubble Space Telescope and almost to take them for granted. The most recent images – dubbed ‘celestial fireworks’ – show a stellar ‘nursery’ in which young and very vigorous stars unleash a ferocious solar wind that sculpts the surrounding gas clouds into fantastic shapes, stimulating further star formation. We are glimpsing processes that once prevailed in our part of the galaxy – the forces that formed our sun and shaped our world.In my view, Hubble is the most important scientific instrument that mankind has ever built, perhaps only matched by the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. Its position in orbit outside of the earth’s atmosphere gives it unmatched resolution at visible wavelengths, without distortion and background light. Whilst the performance of ground-based telescopes has improved enormously since Hubble was launched, the space telescope can still observe objects that are fainter and in any part of the night sky – a hugely powerful and flexible research tool.Hubble has helped us to determine the age of the universe, the rate at which it is expanding, and the fact that this expansion is accelerating, leading to the latest theories about ‘dark energy’. Other discoveries include evidence for the presence of planets around other stars, observations of some of the most distant objects ever seen, and a more detailed view of planets and moons in our own solar system.What’s more, Hubble is an incredible engineering achievement, whose recent triumphs have only been achieved after many setbacks. It has been in orbit for 25 years now, and was conceived around 20 years before that, with up to 5,000 people working on its design and construction.However, for a while after it was launched, Hubble was a laughing stock: an incorrectly ground mirror meant that the first images that it generated were barely better than those taken from earth. Subsequent enquiries showed a sorry tale of deception about escalating costs, political manoeuvring, unrealistic schedules and insufficient resource allocation.Thankfully NASA had designed Hubble to be serviceable, and a series of Space Shuttle missions installed upgraded optics and instruments to restore and then boost its capabilities. The last of these upgrade missions was performed in the aftermath of the Columbia shuttle disaster and in the face of political resistance, requiring lengthy space walks and remarkable dexterity from the astronauts charged with the repair job. This daring tale is brilliantly told in the Hubble 3D movie: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/hubble_3d/. I watched this in an IMAX theatre at Washington’s Air & Space Museum and it blew me away!The story of the Hubble Space Telescope is one of far-sighted vision and ambition, undermined by human error and organisational frailties, then redeemed by the inventiveness of scientists and the bravery and skill of astronauts. It remains a monument to the curiosity, the imagination, the persistence and the ingenuity of humankind. An inspiration for all of us as we engage in our more modest endeavours down here on earth.The story of Hubble is told in engrossing style in Robert Zimmerman’s book THE UNIVERSE IN A MIRROR: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It: http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Universe-Mirror-Telescope-Visionaries/dp/0691146357

⭐I am a great fan of the makers of Hubble telescope. it’s an odyssey of the epic telescope which is written in superb narrative style

Keywords

Free Download The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It in PDF format
The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It PDF Free Download
Download The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It 2010 PDF Free
The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It 2010 PDF Free Download
Download The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It PDF
Free Download Ebook The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Space Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It