Supernovae and Nucleosynthesis

Abstract

ISBN: 0 691 01147 8 The subtitle of the book is An investigation of the history of matter, from the Big Bang to the present. The author tells us in the preface what sort of book the present text is intended to be. `This book is not intended to be a scientific history, a textbook or a review, although it has some of these elements and could serve these purposes. It is intended to be what was well described by Professor S Chandrasekhar in reference to his own goals for scientific books: ``...a certain viewpoint of the field, written by one who has been an active participant in its development...''. The subject is the synthesis and evolution of atomic nuclei, by thermonuclear reactions, from the Big Bang to the present. What is the origin and history of the matter of which we are made?' This 600-page-long book contains 14 chapters with thorough expositions of topics such as Observed abundances of nuclei, Aspects of nuclear physics, Cosmological nucleosynthesis, Properties of different types of stars, Thermonuclear explosions, Gravitational collapse, Supernovae and Galactic evolution. Each topic is treated in a fundamental way, exhibiting the physical ideas, and the way they are formulated mathematically, in order that models with quantitative predictive power may be constructed. The book also contains several appendixes with additional mathematical treatments of Equations of state, Stellar structure and Supernovae light curves. Also there are 712 references, 119 figures and 68 tables, and it is useful that the author has provided lists of the figures and tables at the beginning of the book. Concerning the way he writes about the evolution of stars, Arnett says: `Because of the complicated interplay of the various physical processes involved, stellar evolutionary theory involves the construction of complex mathematical models. Because of this complexity, the equations which result are almost never soluble in a simple way. To proceed it was necessary to resort to brute force, and build numerical models of stars in a computer. In this book, complex numerical results are often described in terms of analytic approximations: simpler equations are solved by conventional means, and then woven together to represent the actual solution. There is a fundamental reason for this approach. Stellar evolutionary calculations may profitably be viewed as numerical experiments. Representation of these reams of numbers by simple approximations is a step toward understanding the interplay of the various physical processes involved.' Much of my own research has been concerned with cosmological problems, so I read the chapter on Cosmological nucleosynthesis with particular attention. A close reading reveals some properties of the presentation that seem characteristic of the book. Initially there are some physical considerations, in the present case about cosmic kinetics. A simple model is chosen and described mathematically; here a `Newtonian' dust-filled spherical mass distribution. Arnett's book is mainly concerned with nucleosynthesis and not with relativistic cosmology, so the conceptual framework of the latter is not presented. For example, the expansion factor is treated as the radius of the cosmic mass distribution, and the cosmic red shift of light is presented on few lines in a rather ad hoc manner. The effect of pressure on the dynamics of the cosmic fluid is introduced by writing a relativistic formula with reference to Tolman's classical book on cosmology. Arnett's book is not logically self-contained. You should not expect to be able to read this book from page 1 and onwards understanding all that you read from the text. The topic of the book is just too encompassing to allow this. The reader wanting to understand everything in Arnett's book must study several of the references and be prepared to take some years! The bonus would be that this person would end up as a good physicist. The book is obviously intended to become a standard reference volume on Supernovae and Nucleosynthesis, and it clearly will succeed in this. This is a book all researchers, from graduate students to well established senior researchers on these topics should consult. If you intend to work for some time on these matters you should have your own copy of the book!