false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1180233309m/1013145.jpg 1013145 4 In 1960 Captain Joseph Kittinger fell to earth from the edge of space and survived. He stepped from the basket of a gigantic helium balloon into an appalling, hostile environment which, without the protection of a pressure suit, would have simultaneously frozen his body and boiled away his blood. And yet it is the air that Kittinger fell through that makes our lives on earth possible. We not only live in the air, we live because of it. And air is about much more than just breathing. At ground level air transforms miraculously into solid food, and without it every creature on earth would starve; it wraps our planet in a blanket of warmth; radio signals bounce off a floating mirror of metal in the air to travel round the world; and the outer layer of our atmosphere soaks up flares from the sun more violent than all the world's nuclear warheads put together. Gabrielle Walker traces a journey of groundbreaking scientific discovery, from the Italian Renaissance scientist Torricelli, disciple of Galileo, who realised that we live at the bottom of a dense ocean of air, to the West Virginian farmhand William Ferrel, who unlocked the secrets of the trade winds by making calculations with a pitchfork on the back of a barn door. Then there is the hapless 1920s inventor Thomas Midgley, who when trying to solve a refrigeration problem inadvertently created chemicals that punched a hole in the sky, and the extraordinary American discovery at the height of the Cold War that space itself is radioactive. An Ocean of Air is a triumphant celebration of the fragile complexity of Earth's atmosphere and a completely engaging work of popular science. 999269 11 2007 An Ocean of Air: A Natural History of the Atmosphere total:41|5:8|4:21|3:9|2:2|1:1| 41 156 90 13 0 0 false false Thu Feb 05 09:52:32 -0800 2009 Thu Feb 05 09:52:32 -0800 2009 Although Gabrielle Walker, author of Snowball Earth (2003), holds a Cambridge doctorate in chemistry, her ear for storytelling is perfect for popular science. One critic praises her lyrical style; others praise her use of detail, anecdote, and science that wouldn't be out of place in Meteorology 101...

more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Apr 15 10:21:52 -0700 2008 Tue Apr 15 10:21:56 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 0 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Fri Nov 02 10:31:05 -0700 2007 Thu Mar 06 23:14:20 -0800 2008 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Fri Dec 21 09:23:29 -0800 2007 Sat Dec 29 19:01:38 -0800 2007 more...]]> 5 0 false false Thu Nov 27 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 29 14:22:49 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 29 14:25:04 -0800 2008 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sun Mar 01 14:27:02 -0800 2009 Wed Feb 18 20:23:17 -0800 2009 Sun Mar 01 14:27:02 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Apr 21 09:44:08 -0700 2009 Tue Apr 21 09:44:38 -0700 2009 3 0 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Oct 25 07:18:31 -0700 2007 Thu Oct 25 07:18:31 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Wed Jan 02 16:37:01 -0800 2008 Sun Mar 09 21:09:55 -0700 2008 Air! A whole book about it. Also, the characters who leant to the discovery of our atmosphere. Thought provoking; ranges in topics from the chemical makeup of air, hurricanes, ozone layer, trade winds, jet streams, the northern lights. If you can stomach history and science -toget...more...]]> 5 0 false false Sun Sep 21 19:39:56 -0700 2008 Sun Mar 30 20:59:52 -0700 2008 Sun Sep 21 19:39:56 -0700 2008 4 0 false false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Fri Dec 07 21:26:15 -0800 2007 Fri Dec 07 21:27:43 -0800 2007 3 0 false false Tue Feb 19 12:28:14 -0800 2008 Tue Feb 19 12:31:13 -0800 2008 4 0 false false Mon Aug 17 15:30:09 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 17 15:31:07 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Wed Oct 07 21:48:15 -0700 2009 Wed Oct 07 21:48:15 -0700 2009 3 0 false false Sun Sep 20 16:37:02 -0700 2009 Sun Sep 20 16:37:02 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Fri Jul 17 06:57:18 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 17 06:57:18 -0700 2009 3 0 false false Mon Aug 10 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 15 07:25:26 -0700 2009 Wed Aug 12 07:21:25 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Fri Jul 03 19:51:51 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 03 19:51:51 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Thu Jul 02 08:08:16 -0700 2009 Thu Jul 02 08:08:18 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Wed Jul 01 07:08:34 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 01 07:08:34 -0700 2009 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=1013145