Close Encounters: Exploring the Universe With the Hubble Telescope - Hardcover

Spectacular full-color photographs and computer images will attract readers to this volume of current information about the universe, but Scott (Twins!, p. 117) assumes a lot of prior knowledge on the part of readers, and there is no glossary of terms nor timeline to help with the context. The discussion begins with early telescopes and scientists, including Ptolemy, Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, and Newton, and proceeds rapidly on to Hubble's Theory of the Expanding Universe. She explains how images from the Hubble Telescope support earlier theories and have changed scientist's ideas about the formation of the universe, the planets in our solar system, and distant galaxies. Throughout are thumbnail sketches of contemporary astronomers and their work. Also included: a discussion of the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet collision with Jupiter in 1995, the birth and death of stars and galaxies, protoplanetary disks in Orion, supernovas, and speculation on black holes and life on other planets. The fussy design detracts from the discussion: Text superimposed on photographs is difficult to read; boxes of colored type are inserted in photographs or into the margins. It's a challenging title, with appeal mostly for highly motivated science enthusiasts. (index) (Nonfiction. 10-14) -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Grade 5-8AScott follows up her Adventure in Space: The Flight to Fix the Hubble (Hyperion, 1995) with this equally outstanding explanation of why the effort to repair the orbiting telescope's faulty components was worthwhile. She opens with a telling pair of before-and-after photographs: the first a blur that looks like a fried green egg, the second a sharply focused, dramatically swirling spiral galaxy. After a summary history of astronomy and telescopes, the author goes on to describe the value of this new clarity; scientists can now observe phenomena as close in time and space as local weather on Mars, or as distant as the birth of solar systems, the deaths of stars, and the mysteries of black holes. Artists' renditions and archival portraits of scientists involved with the space telescope enhance the many vividly reproduced full-color photos of deep space. In her matching text, Scott is specific about both how the different instruments on Hubble are used, and what they tell us. Some pages of text are printed on grayed-out star fields, not the best choice for legibility, but that's a minor bobble in this meaty, cogent report.AJohn Peters, New York Public Library
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.