We were thrilled to read Jennifer Schuessler’s terrific story on the popular phenomenon of bar lecturing (and not in an intoxicated way, but a learned way!) Check out her story here. It looks like alcohol and science is a powerful (and successful) formula.

The Press is pleased to have had the pleasure of working with the Secret Science Club as they’ve hosted talks for a handful of our science authors. In particular, I was delighted to see friend-of-the-Press Dorian Devins at the SSC getting a mention!

We invite you to view our new 2012 physics and astrophysics catalog at:
http://press.princeton.edu/catalogs/physics12.pdf

Be sure to check out all of the wonderful series featured in this catalog, including In a Nutshell and Princeton Frontiers in Physics, as well as our great textbook options. New and forthcoming titles include How to Build a Habitable Planet by Charles H. Langmuir & Wally Broecker, Strange New Worlds by Ray Jayawardhana, Reinventing Discovery by Michael Nielsen, The Ultimate Book of Saturday Science by Neil A. Downie, and more. Many new paperbacks and ebooks are also available. It’s easy to download the catalog to your smartphone or tablet for browsing.

We’re at this year’s AAS meeting in Austin, TX. Stop by and visit us at booth #211.

If you are in the New York City area this Monday, October 3, please come out to the Amercan Museum of Natural History’s Hayden Planetarium to see author and astronomer Ray Jayawardhana discuss his new book STRANGE NEW WORLDS: The Search for Alien Planets and life beyond Our Solar System. The event begins at 7:30 PM for the Hayden’s renowned Fronters in Astrophysics lecture series.

To whet your appetite, check out Ray’s recent talk at Google below.

Before we get all the way back to the Big Bang, there may have been a time when stars like our Sun and galaxies like our Milky Way did not exist, because the Universe was denser than it is now. Harvard professor Avi Loeb explores how and when the first stars and galaxies formed in this talk taped at the Santa Barbara Museum of Science.

We are the publishers of Loeb’s recent book titled, appropriately enough, How Did the First Stars and Galaxies Form?

Even though the cover is reversed, that galley is easily recognizable as Reinventing Discovery by Michael Nielsen. We expect finished books in October, but so far most of the reactions have been, well, you can see for yourself…

Via our friends at Citizen Science Quarterly.

David Weintraub’s most recent book, How Old Is the Universe?, is a readable investigation of the title question that explains how we have arrived at an approximate age of 13.7 billion years for the universe. Weintraub works his way from biblical chronology of the origins of the universe to the high-tech astronomy research taking place today in this accessible and entertaining history. We recently posed some questions to Prof. Weintraub by email and are pleased to present this dialogue.

PUP: I am not an astronomer, so I was relieved to discover I could actually read How Old Is the Universe? You clearly went to great efforts to make the text accessible. How difficult was it to break down these big scientific ideas, terms, and facts for general readers?

Professor David Weintraub: Making sure I was speaking to a non-professional audience in English rather than in the jargon-filled language of astronomy was a constant challenge. A major goal with this book is to help general-audience readers understand the complicated and unfamiliar concepts described between the covers. Consequently I focused on this issue quite literally with every word I wrote. At the risk of being struck down by the gods for hubris, I do think I have done better at this than most astronomers who are trying to communicate with a non-professional audience. Nevertheless, more than a few of my descriptions passed through my ‘language of the lay reader’ filter unnoticed by me. Fortunately, Princeton University Press assigned my manuscript to an editor who asked me lots of excellent questions for clarification, and quite often her questions arose when she bumped into a piece of text in which the meaning was unclear to her because of my too-technical word choices. I do think, in the end, the presentation of difficult concepts in this book is accessible to the general reader because we paid such close attention to language and because I continually reminded myself of whom the readership of the book is intended to be. My editor was a humanist who knew no astronomy before beginning to edit the book. So she was my test reader; if she didn’t understand my words, I flunked the test. When we were done, she felt that she understood every word and had learned and now understood everything in the book. Fortunately for her and all readers, unless you are in one of my classes, there is no test at the end of each chapter.

Continue reading this Q&A after the jump.

We would like to see you at the American Physical Society meeting in Dallas.
Stop by booth no. 719 to say hello and browse new books:

Physics and Technology for Future Presidents:
An Introduction to the Essential Physics Every World Leader Needs to Know
By Richard A. Muller

Condensed Matter in a Nutshell
By Gerald D. Mahan

Statistical and Thermal Physics:
With Computer Applications
By Harvey Gould & Jan Tobochnik

Principles of Laser Spectroscopy and Quantum Optics
By Paul R. Berman & Vladimir S. Malinovsky

Engineering Dynamics:
A Comprehensive Introduction
By N. Jeremy Kasdin & Derek A. Paley

Check out our 2011 Physics & Astrophysics catalog for more new and forthcoming titles:
http://press.princeton.edu/catalogs/physics11.pdf

Hope to see you there!
#apsmarch

Recent articles in Princeton Global Science include: A response from Louise Barrett to Nicholas Wade’s article for the New York Times on dog cognition. Louise is the author of the forthcoming book Beyond the Brain: How Body and Environment Shape Animal and Human Minds which will revolutionize how we think about and define intelligence. Richard Crossley Unplugged provided some hints on becoming a better birder and tips on identifying birds by size. We also saw some early reviews for this revolutionary bird ID guide. PUP author Roland Kays (Mammals of North America, 2nd edition) began his stint as a guest-blogger for the New York Times. David Weintraub, author of How Old Is the Universe?, is interviewed by Sean Moncrieff on Ireland’s Newstalk radio. Josh Bloom has a book launch for What Are Gamma-Ray Bursts? at the American Astronomical Society conference. Our jacket designers give us a glimpse into the creativity that goes into a striking cover like the one for The Silicon Jungle by Shumeet Baluja, a novel of deception and mystery that gets at the heart of privacy issues and the googlization of information. And lastly, Eugene Kaplan, author of What’s Eating You?: People and Parasites, invites you to become an adventurous eater.

Like Princeton Global Science? Subscribe to our RSS Feed here: http://press.princeton.edu/blog/category/pgs/feed/.

This picture was taken at the book party for What Are Gamma-Ray Bursts? at the recent meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

Gamma-ray bursts have been accused of causing mass extinctions here on Earth, but do we really have a good understanding of what they are? In the new book What Are Gamma-Ray Bursts? (part of the new Princeton Frontiers in Physics series), Joshua Bloom gives us the most comprehensive and up-to-date explanation of the discovery and physics of gamma-ray bursts.

Chapter 1 of the book is available online now.

We enjoyed a nice long break for the New Year, but we’re happy to present Issue 9 of Princeton Global Science. Richard Crossley, author of The Crossley ID Guide, explains in two videos how you can make your backyard more bird-friendly by incorporating bird baths and bird feeders (Check out the gorgeous birds in this [...]

Introducing our new 2011 Physics and Astrophysics catalog at:
http://press.princeton.edu/catalogs/physics11.pdf

See page 2 for our new series, The Princeton Frontiers in Physics. The series offers short introductions to some of today’s most exciting and dynamic research across the physical sciences. Abraham Loeb’s How Did the First Stars and Galaxies Form? and Joshua S. Bloom’s What are Gamma-Ray Bursts? launch the series. Great books for students, scientists, and scientifically minded general readers.

Additions to the Princeton Series in Astrophysics include Bruce T. Draine’s Physics of the Interstellar and Intergalactic Medium and Sara Seager’s Exoplanet Atmospheres. Professors, make sure to check out pages 3-5 for more textbooks.

The catalog is full of new titles by leading experts. We invite you to browse and download the catalog. If you’re at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Seattle, please stop by booth 301 and say hello. Hope to see you there.