Black Hole Chasers
The Amazing True Story of an Astronomical Breakthrough
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
In Black Hole Chasers, award-winning investigative journalist Anna Crowley Redding presents the riveting true story of one of the most inspiring scientific breakthroughs of our lifetime—the Event Horizon Telescope team's reveal of the first image of a super massive black hole.
In April 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope Team unveiled the first ever image of a super massive black hole.
This inspiring scientific breakthrough took years of hard work, innovative thinking, and a level of global cooperation never seen before. The challenge was immense. The goal was impossible. They would need a telescope as big as the earth itself. The technology simply didn’t exist. And yet, a multi-national team of scientists was able to show the world an image of something previously unseeable.
Based off extensive research and hours interviews with many of the team's ground-breaking scientists, physicists, and mathematicians, Black Hole Chasers is a story of unique technological innovation and scientific breakthroughs, but more importantly, it's a story of human curiosity and triumph.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This accessible account chronicles the complex work of the Event Horizon Telescope Project in 2019 to capture and publish definitive data about and photographs of black holes, which no human had ever seen. Journalist Redding (Google It) capably documents the history of black holes and the compelling story of how American astrophysicist Sheperd Doeleman and German radio astronomer Heino Falcke created a global team to investigate their existence and garner the first black hole photo using a complex network of connecting radio telescopes around the world. The narrative breaks down difficult vocabulary and concepts such as gravitational collapse, and offers relatable contextualizing examples, for instance comparing the space-time fabric to the surface of a trampoline. Some pop culture references prove distracting, including a tangent about the television series MacGyver, but short biographies of notable scientists and contributors to the project highlights its history, diversity, scope, and complexity. Dramatic b&w photographs and diagrams not only break down the anatomy of black holes but also illustrate the project's scale. The twists and turns of this scientific breakthrough should pique reader curiosity about innovation. Ages 9–12.
