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Rating: 
Summary: Readable and authoritative guide to stellar evolution
Review: I read a lot of astronomy books, so any one book tends only to reinforce what I know already, plus just a little bit of additional information. This book was different. I learned a lot about star formation and particularly about the meaning of the ubiquitous Hertzsprung-Russell diagram. The diagram is obligatory in a discussion of any astronomy other than planetary, but it tends to be described rather than explained. Here Kipenhahn goes through the life of stars of various sizes, showing their evolution along the H-R diagram and why the "main sequence" is so thickly populated (simply, because that's when the stars are burning hydrogen, which is what they do most but not all of the time). Once done with the basics, he goes on to cover binary stars, neutron stars, and other stellar oddities. He also devotes a chapter to planetary formation and the possibility of life on other planets. Three brief but valuable appendices cover the measurement of stellar velocities, distances, and masses. This book is a treasure and an authoritative work on the topic. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: galactical
Review: with out question one of the most exciting books about star evolution.
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