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    Popular Books

    Many excellent books have been written with the public or non-expert in mind. These books are excellent reading for students in the field to better learn how to explain your science to a layperson and develop a better understanding of your work within the larger framework of our field.
    1. EINSTEIN'S UNFINISHED SYMPHONY
      Marcia Bartusiak, *** (****).
      ****.

    2. THE ELEGANT UNIVERSE
      Brian Greene, *** (****).
      ****.

    3. QED - THE STRANGE THEORY OF LIGHT AND MATTER
      Richard Feynman, *** (****).
      ****.

    4. A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME
      Stephen Hawking, *** (****).
      ****.

    5. COSMOS
      Carl Sagan, *** (****).
      ****.

    6. BLACK HOLES AND TIME WARPS
      Kip S. Thorne, *** (****).
      ****.

    Student Texts

    There are more books on the market than any of us could ever hope to buy or read. Below are some recommendations of books that we think are useful for the students in our group. YMMV; if you have recommendations of books you think are useful, send them our way!

    RELATIVITY (Standard Texts)

    1. GRAVITATION (a.k.a. MTW)
      Misner, Thorne & Wheeler, Freeman (1973).
      The classic, encyclopedic text on all things gravity.

    2. A FIRST COURSE IN GENERAL RELATIVITY
      Bernard Schutz, Cambridge (1985).
      Easy to carry, easy to read. Think "MTW Lite."

    3. GENERAL RELATIVITY
      Robert Wald, Chicago (1984).
      Thoroughly modern viewpoint, more mathematical than MTW.

    4. SPACETIME AND GEOMETRY
      Sean Carroll, Pearson (2004).
      An excellent introductory text with lots of framework.

    5. GRAVITY: AN INTRODUCTION TO EINSTEIN'S GENERAL RELATIVITY
      James Hartle, Addison Wesley (2003).
      Good introductory text with many physical applications.

    6. GRAVITATION AND COSMOLOGY
      Stephen Weinberg, Wiley (1972).
      Easy to read; lots of applications not found (clearly) elsewhere.

    OTHER RELATIVITY

    1. SPACETIME PHYSICS
      Taylor & Wheeler, Freeman (1992).
      If you want to understand special relativity, this is the book.

    2. EXPLORING BLACK HOLES
      Taylor & Wheeler, Addison Wesley (2000).
      Great introduction to the physics of black holes with only calculus and algebra.

    QUANTUM FIELD THEORY

    There are many textbooks on quantum field theory; the levels and coverage vary drastically.
    1. AN INTRODUCTION TO QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
      Peskin and Schroeder, Addison-Wesley (1995).

    2. QUANTUM FIELD THEORY IN A NUTSHELL
      Anthony Zee, Princeton (2003).

    3. QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
      Lewis H. Ryder, **** (***).

    4. QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
      Lowell H. Brown, Cambridge (1994).

    More advanced texts include:
    1. QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
      Itzykson and Zuber, Dover (2006).

    2. THE QUANTUM THEORY OF FIELDS (3 Vols)
      Stephen Weinberg, Cambridge (2002).

    3. QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
      Ramond, **** (***).

    STRING THEORY

    1. SUPERSTRING THEORY (2 Vols)
      Green, Schwarz and Witten, Cambridge (1988).

    2. STRING THEORY (2 Vols)
      Joseph Polchinski, Cambridge (1998).

    3. A FIRST COURSE IN STRING THEORY
      Barton Zwiebach, **** (2009).

    4. STRING THEORY AND M-THEORY: A MODERN INTRODUCTION
      K. Becker, M. Becker and J. Schwarz, **** (2007).

    GRAVITATIONAL WAVES

    There are very few actual textbooks on gravitational wave physics; mine will be done someday. The standard texts in relativity generally have sections on gravitational waves. The following supplemental books may also be useful.
    1. GRAVITATIONAL WAVES VOL 1: THEORY AND EXPERIMENTS
      Michele Maggiore, Oxford (2008).
      The first real textbook that I know of -- lots of introductory material about all the things we normally talk and worry about.

    2. FUNDAMENTALS OF INTERFEROMETRIC GRAVITATIONAL WAVE DETECTORS
      Peter Saulson, World Scientific (1994).
      The best reference about interferometric observatories I know.

    ASTROPHYSICS & COSMOLOGY

    For introductory astronomy topics, any 101 level text will suffice; most all of them cover the same material, and are full of pretty pictures from NASA. Find one that you like and go with it.

    A good full survey book (coffee table -- not textbook) is:

    1. UNIVERSE: The Definitive Visual Guide
      Martin Rees (Ed.), DK (2005).
      Two pages on every topic in astrophysics, lots of pretty pictures, edited by real astrophysicists, and stargazing information!

    The following texts are useful for students interested in doing astrophysical computations, and astrophysics related to gravity:
    1. AN INTRODUCTION TO MODERN ASTROPHYSICS
      Brad Carroll & Dale Ostlie, Pearson (2007).
      An encylopedic senior undergraduate text -- the perfect reference!

    2. THEORETICAL ASTROPHYSICS (VOLS 1-3)
      T. Padmanabhan, Cambridge (2000).
      Three volumes of detailed coverage of everything from general astrophysical processes, to stars, to cosmology.

    3. BLACK HOLES, NEUTRON STARS and WHITE DWARFS
      Shapiro & Teukolsky, Wiley (1983).
      Excellent text on the astrophysics of compact stellar remnants.

    4. ASTRONOMY METHODS
      Hale Bradt, Cambridge (2004).
      My preferred text explaining how astronomers work with their data and interpret it.

    5. INTRODUCTION TO COSMOLOGY
      Barbara Ryden, Addison Wesely (2003).
      Modern introduction to cosmology, easily accessible to undergraduate students.

    6. THE EARLY UNIVERSE
      Kolb & Turner, Addison Wesely (1994).
      Readable introduction to the physics of the early Universe, including topics relating particle physics to cosmology.

    7. PRINCIPLES OF PHYSICAL COSMOLOGY
      P. J. E. Peebles, Princeton (1993).
      Standard reference in cosmology.
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    Page Maintained by: Shane L. Larson
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    Last Updated: 21 March 2009