The Cosmic Chemical Bond

Introducing astrochemistry to a wide audience, this book describes how molecules formed in chemical reactions occur in a range of environments in interstellar and circumstellar space, from shortly after the Big Bang up to the present epoch. Stressing that chemistry in these environments needs to be driven, it helps identify these drivers and the various chemical networks that operate giving rise to signature molecules that enable the physics of the region to be better understood. The book emphasises, in a non-mathematical way, the chemistry of the Milky Way Galaxy and its planet-forming regions, describes how other galaxies may have rather different chemistries and shows how chemistry was important even in the Early Universe when most of the elements had yet to be formed. This book will appeal to anyone with a general interest in chemistry, from students to professional scientists working in interdisciplinary areas and non-scientists fascinated by the evolving and exciting story of chemistry in the cosmos.

This is the perfect complement to "Chemical Bonding - Across the Periodic Table" by the same editors, who are two of the top scientists working on this topic, each with extensive experience and important connections within the community. The resulting book is a unique overview of the different approaches used for describing a chemical bond, including molecular-orbital based, valence-bond based, ELF, AIM and density-functional based methods. It takes into account the many developments that have taken place in the field over the past few decades due to the rapid advances in quantum chemical models and faster computers.

A unique overview of the different kinds of chemical bonds that can be found in the periodic table, from the main-group elements to transition elements, lanthanides and actinides. It takes into account the many developments that have taken place in the field over the past few decades due to the rapid advances in quantum chemical models and faster computers. This is the perfect complement to "Chemical Bonding - Fundamentals and Models" by the same editors, who are two of the top scientists working on this topic, each with extensive experience and important connections within the community.

If you have ever wondered how we get from the awesome impersonality of the Big Bang universe to the point where living creatures can start to form, and evolve into beings like you, your friends and your family, wonder no more. Steve Miller provides us with a tour through the chemical evolution of the universe, from the formation of the first molecules all the way to the chemicals required for life to evolve. Using a simple Hydrogen molecule – known as H-three-plus - as a guide, he takes us on a journey that starts with the birth of the first stars, and how, in dying, they pour their hearts out into enriching the universe in which we live. Our molecular guide makes its first appearance at the source of the Chemical Cosmos, at a time when only three elements and a total of 11 molecules existed. From those simple beginnings, H-three-plus guides us down river on the violent currents of exploding stars, through the streams of the Interstellar Medium, and into the delta where new stars and planets form. We are finally left on the shores of the sea of life. Along the way, we meet the key characters who have shaped our understanding of the chemistry of the universe, such as Cambridge physicist J.J. Thomson and the Chicago chemist Takeshi Oka. And we are given an insider’s view of just how astronomers, making use of telescopes and Earth-orbiting satellites, have put together our modern view of the Chemical Cosmos.

This is the first book devoted to a study of the chemistry of cosmic dust, presenting current thinking on the subject distilled from many publications in surface and solid-state science, and in astronomy.

This profusely illustrated book, by a world-renowned chemist and award-winning chemistry teacher, provides science students with an introduction to atomic and molecular structure and bonding. (This is a reprint of a book first published by Benjamin/Cummings, 1973.)

" This is one of the most important books on quantum mechanics ever written for lay readers, in which an eminent physicist and successful science writer, Heinz Pagels, discusses and explains the core concepts of physics without resorting to complicated mathematics. "Can be read by anyone. I heartily recommend it!" -- New York Times Book Review. 1982 edition"--

Providing the quantum-mechanical foundations of chemical bonding, this unique textbook emphasizes key concepts such as superposition, degeneracy of states and the role of the electron spin. An initial, concise and compact presentation of the rudiments of quantum mechanics enables readers to progress through the book with a firm grounding. Experimental examples are included to illustrate how the abstract concepts are manifest in real systems.

Some of the contents: "It" or the Eternity of Perfection; "The New Name"; the Day of Judgment; the Kingdom at Hand; Humanity's Ceaseless quest for End of Long Road, etc.

Text for back cover page. Bright Hole Cosmos invites you to replace the Big Bang paradigm of a unique cosmic origin and expansion by multi-bang expansions followed by contractions within a permanent cosmic recycling of all electronuclear material. The progenitors of stars and galaxies are found in expanding shells colliding with their neighbours along dynamic common walls which are home to groups of galaxies that will in turn migrate to clusters. Large clusters end up in the crushing gravitational claws of giant black holes whose final compacted destiny is a maxi-bang event, the birth of a new expanding bubble. A new method is presented to compute galactic rotation velocities from Doppler shift field data whereby Newtonian dynamics is adapted and applied to point-like corrections on a disk. The Standard Model of electronuclear particles is introduced with a questioning on the speed of gravity and the Planck units where a mare incognitum is found.