Not since Newton's apple has there been a physics phenomenon as deliciously appealing to the masses as Frank Close's Cosmic Onion. Widely embraced by scientists and laypersons alike, the book quickly became an international bestseller. Translated into seven languages, it propelled the author to become a worldwide celebrity as well as an inspiration to a generation of scientists. The book's title itself has entered popular usage as a metaphor for the layers that can be peeled away to understand the foundations of the physical world, from dimensions and galaxies, to atoms and quarks.

"Close is a lucid, reliable, and enthusiastic guide to the strange and wonderful microcosmic world that dwells deep within reality"
- Frank Wilczek, Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics, MIT, 2004 Nobel Prize in Physics

NEW Material

• Explains the principles behind the Hadron Collider as well as the potential it presents
• Considers the recent development of the Electroweak Theory as a law of nature
• Explores the mysteries uncovered and the ones that may be in store with regard to top and bottom quarks

Keeping still-pertinent contents from the original volume that caught the world's attention in 1983, this fresh edition of the Cosmic Onion includes extensive new material to reflect new views of the universe. Providing explanations that explore the foundations of 21st Century science and future directions, this work offers ready access and unique perspectives to more typical topics such as the forces of nature, atoms, the nucleus, and nuclear particles.

It also travels down paths that only a true pioneer and educator can venture, such as a discussion of what Professor Close refers to as the Eightfold Way including the findings, surprises, and new questions emerging from the latest work with accelerators.

Reviews

"... it is correspondingly rewarding to readers who work their way through it. Using diagrams, analogies, and simplified versions of complicated mathematics, the author largely follows the historical order of discovery. ... Widely accepted information is explained in terms of widely accepted concepts, and the reader is assured that it comes with no strings attached. ... Summing up: Highly recommended ."
- D. Park, emeritus, Williams College, in Choice, Vol. 44, No. 11, July 2007

"There seems little doubt that this version of The New Cosmic Onion will prove just as popular as the 1983 edition and encourage many of today's students to apply for physics undergraduate courses."

- G. Miller, St. Paul's School, in Contemporary Physics, November 2007

". . . you get a text which is lucid, engaging and accurate . . . Overall what one gets with this text is an excellent accessible introduction to particle physics and quantumchromodynamics (QCD) which will serve both the pre-university and university markets."

- Gren Ireson, Loughborough University, in Physical Science Educational Review, 2007, Vol. 8, No. 1

"New accelerators are being built that will show how the seeds of matter were created when our universe was less than a billionth of a second old. The discoveries in this century promise to be no less revolutionary than in the last . . . The New Cosmic Onion will provide the explanations that students, opinion formers and intelligent citizens need if they are to understand how science has come to this frontier, and where we think it is headed in the immediate future."
from the Foreword

Book Information
ISBN 9781584887980
Author Frank Close
Format Paperback
Page Count 232
Imprint CRC Press Inc
Publisher Taylor & Francis Inc
Weight(grams) 430g