James Van Allen [[electronic resource] ] : the first eight billion miles / / Abigail Foerstner

• Record Nr.: UNINA9910454153703321
• Autore: Foerstner Abigail <1949->
• Pubbl/distr/stampa: Iowa City, : University of Iowa Press, c2007
• ISBN: 1-58729-720-5
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (377 p.)
• Disciplina: 523.01092; B
• Soggetti: Astrophysicists - Iowa; Electronic books.
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Note generali: Description based upon print version of record.
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographical references (p. [295]-306) and index.
• Nota di contenuto: Frontier roots -- Heartland boyhood -- The making of a scientist -- Physicists to the war effort -- Enter Abigail Fithian Halsey -- The dawn of space exploration -- The mighty little aerobee -- It's a rocket! It's a balloon! It's a rockoon! -- Sputnik and the space race -- Countdown to explorer I -- Celebrity scientist and the birth of NASA -- Discovery of the radiation belts -- Space shield for the Cold War -- Space as a cottage industry -- The mariners -- Pioneers to the outer planets -- Space politics -- Journey to the edge of the solar system.
• Sommario/riassunto: Astrophysicist and space pioneer James Van Allen (1914-2006), for whom the Van Allen radiation belts were named, was among the principal scientific investigators for twenty-four space missions, including Explorer I in 1958, the first successful U.S. satellite; Mariner 2's 1962 flyby of Venus, the first successful mission to another planet; and the 1970's Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11, missions that surveyed Jupiter and Saturn. Abigail Foerstner blends space science, drama, military agenda's, cold war politics, and the events of Van Allen's lengthy career to create the first biography of this highl