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This book highlights a comprehensive coverage of X­‐ray and Gamma‐ray astrophysics. The first and the second parts discuss, respectively, X-ray and Gamma-ray experimental techniques and observatories. The third part is devoted to science, including galactic and extragalactic sources. The fourth and last parts are dedicated to analysis techniques in X-ray and Gamma-ray astronomy: spectral analysis, imagining analysis, timing analysis, and polarimetric analysis. Presenting the state of the art in X-ray and gamma-ray astronomy, this is both a valuable book for students and an important reference resource for researchers in the field.

The exoplanet revolution that began three decades ago has drastically changed our knowledge of the extra-solar systems. Today, we face an extreme diversity and complexity of these systems that can only be understood through the intimate link that exists between the planets and their host stars. The understanding, characterization, and the detection of the exoplanets has to be made in close collaboration between stellar and planetary physicists. The purpose of the school and this book is to provide an update of our current knowledge in some selected research fields dedicated to the interplay between stars and planets. It aims to prepare scientists for a rich new decade for exoplanets with space missions like the upcoming PLATO and ARIEL and the new instruments on the VLT and the future ELT.

A comprehensive and up-to-date text in the field of electron scattering and ionization, covering fundamentals, experimental background, quantum scattering theories and applications. Electron impact ionization of atoms and molecules in ground/metastable states is discussed comprehensively. The text covers electron scattering phenomena for diatomic and common molecules, polyatomic molecules and radicals including hydro-carbons, fluoro-carbons and other larger molecules together with relevant radical species in detail. Applications of electron impact ionization and excitation in gaseous or plasma and condensed matter is discussed in a separate chapter. Recent advances in the field of electron molecule scattering and ionization for polyatomic molecules is covered extensively.

In this book an international group of specialists discusses studies of exoplanets subjected to extreme stellar radiation and plasma conditions. It is shown that such studies will help us to understand how terrestrial planets and their atmospheres, including the early Venus, Earth and Mars, evolved during the host star's active early phase. The book presents an analysis of findings from Hubble Space Telescope observations of transiting exoplanets, as well as applications of advanced numerical models for characterizing the upper atmosphere structure and stellar environments of exoplanets. The authors also address detections of atoms and molecules in the atmosphere of “hot Jupiters” by NASA's Spitzer telescope. The observational and theoretical investigations and discoveries presented are both timely and important in the context of the next generation of space telescopes.The book is divided into four main parts, grouping chapters on exoplanet host star radiation and plasma environments, exoplanet upper atmosphere and environment observations, exoplanet and stellar magnetospheres, and exoplanet observation and characterization. The book closes with an outlook on the future of this research field.

Based on the author's own work and results obtained by international teams he coordinated, this SpringerBrief offers a concise discussion of the origin and early evolution of atmospheres of terrestrial planets during the active phase of their host stars, as well as of the environmental conditions which are necessary in order for planets like the Earth to obtain N_2-rich atmospheres. Possible thermal and non-thermal atmospheric escape processes are discussed in a comparative way between the planets in the Solar System and exoplanets. Lastly, a hypothesis for how to test and study the discussed atmosphere evolution theories using future UV transit observations of terrestrial exoplanets within the orbits of dwarf stars is presented.

Published by the American Geophysical Union as part of the Geophysical Monograph Series, Volume 197.Many of the most basic aspects of the aurora remain unexplained. While in the past terrestrial and planetary auroras have been largely treated in separate books, Auroral Phenomenology and Magnetospheric Processes: Earth and Other Planets takes a holistic approach, treating the aurora as a fundamental process and discussing the phenomenology, physics, and relationship with the respective planetary magnetospheres in one volume. While there are some behaviors common in auroras of the different planets, there are also striking differences that test our basic understanding of auroral processes. The objective, upon which this monograph is focused, is to connect our knowledge of auroral morphology to the physical processes in the magnetosphere that power and structure discrete and diffuse auroras. Understanding this connection will result in a more complete explanation of the aurora and also further the goal of being able to interpret the global auroral distributions as a dynamic map of the magnetosphere. The volume synthesizes five major areas: auroral phenomenology, aurora and ionospheric electrodynamics, discrete auroral acceleration, aurora and magnetospheric dynamics, and comparative planetary aurora. Covering the recent advances in observations, simulation, and theory, this book will serve a broad community of scientists, including graduate students, studying auroras at Mars, Earth, Saturn, and Jupiter. Projected beyond our solar system, it may also be of interest for astronomers who are looking for aurora-active exoplanets.

In the recent decades the theory and observations of disk systems became one of the fast progressing branches of astrophysics. This was stimulated by expansion of astronomical facilities including space-born and ground based - struments, datastoragewithgrowingresolution, thedevelopmentoftheoretical treatment of the processes involved and their modeling with the use of pow- ful computers. Among these processes, of particular interest and importance is the study of disks structure, their dynamics and evolution resulting in different con?gurations, including self-organization, which are basically relevant to the general problems of non-linear dynamic systems. Discussion of this topic was the main focus of the Colloquium “Progress in the Study of Astrophysical Disks: Collective and Stochastic Phenomena and Computational Tools” that was held from September 9 to 11, 2003 in V- gograd, south-east of European Russia. This book is the Proceedings of a c- ference attended by the leading scientists in the?eld from around the world, as well as by young scholars, mostly from the Volgograd State University which hosted the event. Altogether, 28 papers were presented, 22 oral ones and 6 posters, followed by valuable discussions. The book emphasises models of the disk galaxies, the nature of galactic vortices, dynamics of accretion disks with density waves, chaotic and ordered structures including turbulence in the accretion disks, numerical modelling of galactic and accretion disks, and the results of their observation.

An international conference entitled'Zdenek Kopal's Binary Star Legacy'was held on the occasion of the late Professor Kopal's 90th birthday in his home town of Litomyšl/Czech Republic and dedicated to the memory of one of the leading astronomers of the 20th century. Professor Kopal, who devoted 60 years of his scientific life to the exploration of close binary systems, initiated a breakthrough in this field with his description of binary components as non-spherical stars deformed by gravity, with surfaces following Roche equipotentials. Such knowledge triggered the development of new branches of astrophysics dealing with the structure and evolution of close binaries and the interaction effects displayed by exciting objects such as cataclysmic variables, symbiotic stars or X-ray binaries. Contributions to this conference included praise of the achievements of a great astronomer and personal reminiscences brought forward by Kopal's former students and colleagues, and reflected the state of the art of the dynamically evolving field of binary research, which owes so much to the pioneering work of Zdenek Kopal.