exploration

Offers facts and information on space exploration. Includes color photographs, a glossary, and further resources.

This volume describes the techniques with which astronomers and astrophysicists seek out worlds similar to our native planet throughout the vastness of the universe. Breaking down sometimes complicated concepts for beginning students of the cosmos, it includes the history of this planetary quest from ancient to modern times, contemporary methods used to find exoplanets, and their sheer diversity. Altogether, this otherworldly exploration, visually rich with the imagery of the heavens, gives readers a great entry point into a branch of astronomy that has thrilled inquisitive minds for millennia.

Huddled in tense silence, a team of scientists watches a bank of flickering screens. Years of design and engineering work, tests, failures, redesigns, and successes are bound up in this moment. Finally, a grainy picture appears on the screens. Cheers erupt as the men and women realize their robot has landed safely on Mars! Get to Work with Science and Technology is a fascinating new series that introduces readers to the real-life applications of STEM subjects. In Exploring Distant Worlds as a Space Robot Engineer, readers will meet the scientists who design and build robots, send them into space, and even drive the rovers that are exploring Mars today. Told in a lively narrative style, this book includes firsthand accounts of life as a space scientist and robotics engineer, dramatic anecdotes, and behind-the-scenes photos. Readers will also get the chance to try out their robot designing skills with activities that are perfect for science fair projects.

Photographs and simple text introduce young readers to outer space. Includes words to know in English and Spanish.

"The story of the men and women who drove the Voyager spacecraft mission- told by a scientist who was there from the beginning. The Voyager spacecraft are our farthest-flung emissaries-11.3 billion miles away from the crew who built and still operate them, decades since their launch. Voyager 1 left the solar system in 2012; its sister craft, Voyager 2, will do so in 2015. The fantastic journey began in 1977, before the first episode of Cosmos aired. The mission was planned as a grand tour beyond the moon; beyond Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; and maybe even into interstellar space. The fact that it actually happened makes this humanity's greatest space mission. In The Interstellar Age, award-winning planetary scientist Jim Bell reveals what drove and continues to drive the members of this extraordinary team, including Ed Stone, Voyager's chief scientist and the one-time head of NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab; Charley Kohlhase, an orbital dynamics engineer who helped to design many of the critical slingshot maneuvers around planets that enabled the Voyagers to travel so far; and the geologist whose Earth-bound experience would prove of little help in interpreting the strange new landscapes revealed in the Voyagers' astoundingly clear images of moons and planets. Speeding through space at a mind-bending eleven miles a second, Voyager 1 is now beyond our solar system's planets. It carries with it artifacts of human civilization. By the time Voyager passes its first star in about 40,000 years, the gold record on the spacecraft, containing various music and images including Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode," will still be playable"--.

Spacecraft have a very important job—transporting people between Earth and space. Readers explore the history of this mode of transportation, including the spacecraft that brought people to the moon and the Soyuz spacecraft that carry astronauts today. This information is presented to readers through engaging main text and fun fact boxes, which provide additional details about this topic. Readers also learn about the future of space exploration, including spacecraft that could one day take people to Mars. Colorful photographs of spacecraft in action make this an out-of-this-world reading experience!.

A space station is a very unique place to live. How do people who live on space stations get food, air, and water? What kinds of experiments are conducted on them? Readers find out as they explore what life has been like on space stations throughout their history. They tour the Soviet Union space stations of the past as well as today’s International Space Station through enlightening text and detailed photographs. Fun fact boxes provide readers with additional information about space stations and their role in space exploration.

Are people in danger of being hit by falling space garbage? Readers find the answer as they learn about what space garbage is and how it could affect other objects in space and people on Earth. Through comprehensive text, readers learn about the many kinds of space garbage, including pieces of rockets! They also find fact boxes designed to give them even more information about space garbage. This otherworldly problem is shown in vivid detail through amazing photographs. Readers will be excited to learn about space through a closer look at the garbage orbiting Earth.

Satellites are important parts of space exploration as well as everyday life on Earth. They’re used for telephone communications, military strategy, weather observation, and many other purposes. Readers learn about the many uses we have for satellites and how those have changed since the first satellites were launched. Through informative text and helpful fact boxes, readers also explore the history and importance of both the Hubble Space Telescope and the Kepler Space Observatory. Detailed photographs allow readers to see a variety of satellites up close to learn even more about these helpful space objects.