"A clarifying, fascinating, urgently needed book on radiation -- what it is, what should and shouldn't concern us about it, and what place radiation and radiation-related technologies have in our world. The universe and our galaxy and planet Earth were born in a nuclear explosion. We live on a radioactive planet, and without radiation there would be no life here. While radiation can be dangerous, it is also deeply misunderstood and often mistakenly...

Our biology is set up to work in partnership with the sun. Little wonder then that humans have long worshipped and revered our nearest star: life itself arose on earth because its relationship with the sun was a special one, and that relationship still affects us well into the era of electric lighting, indoor workdays, and vitamin D supplements. The fascinating stories, innovative science, and unique perspectives in this book make it clear that the...

Marie Curie (1867-1934) was a pioneering scientist known for her groundbreaking work on radioactivity. She discovered two new elements, polonium and radium, and became the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. Despite facing gender barriers, Curie's determination and intellect propelled her to make significant contributions to atomic physics and medical research. Her legacy as a trailblazer in science continues to inspire generations of scientists and...

Hazel Flagg is the small-town girl who mistakenly believes she's dying of radium poisoning. Sensing a great human interest story, exploitative journalist Wally Cook brings Hazel to New York City and turns her into a media darling, but Wally's strategy takes a sudden turn when he starts having feelings for the vulnerable Hazel.

"A cataclysmic planetary phenomenon is gathering force deep within the Earth. The magnetic North Pole will eventually trade places with the South Pole. Satellite evidence suggests to some scientists that the move has already begun, but most still think it won't happen for many decades. All agree that it has happened many times before and will happen again. But this time it will be different. It will be a very bad day for modern civilization."--Amazon.com....

Eight light years away, a star has died, creating a supernova event that showers Earth in deadly levels of radiation. Within a year, everyone over the age of thirteen will die. And so the countdown begins. Parents apprentice their children and try to pass on the knowledge needed to keep the world running. But when the world is theirs, the last generation may not want to continue the legacy left to them. And in shaping the future however they want,...

World-renowned forensic anthropologist Dr. Bill Bass and acclaimed journalist Jon Jefferson have combined their talents on several New York Times best-sellers. A thrilling tale of suspense, Bones of Betrayal shows why Kathy Reichs praises Bass and Jefferson's "terrific forensic detail" and calls them "the real deal." "Southern-fried forensics. Nothing too fancy, but it does taste good going down."-Kirkus Reviews

The fascinating, curious, and sometimes macabre history of radium as seen in its uses in everyday life. Of all the radioactive elements discovered at the end of the nineteenth century, it was radium that became the focus of both public fascination and entrepreneurial zeal. Half Lives tells the fascinating, curious, sometimes macabre story of the element through its ascendance as a desirable item -a present for a queen, a prize in a treasure hunt,...

"Janet Farrell Brodie explores the Trinity test and those whose contributions have rarely, if ever, been discussed-the men and women who constructed, served, and witnessed the first test, as well as the downwinders who suffered the consequences of the radiation"-- "On July 16, 1945, just weeks before the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that brought about the surrender of Japan and the end of World War II, the United States unleashed the...

In the wake of the Chernobyl disaster the Soviet Union begins to collapse changing forever the lives of a nine-year old child prodigy, his aunt, a leading surgeon, and a teenage boy in a rural village. Russia, 1986. In a run-down apartment block in Moscow, a nine-year-old piano prodigy practices silently for fear of disturbing the neighbours. In a factory on the outskirts of the city, his aunt makes car parts, trying to hide her dissident past. In...