The Invisible Sky: Rosat and the Age of X-Ray Astronomy (Paperback, Softcover Repri)

Preface.- Introduction.- The Invisible Sky.- The History of X-Ray Astronomy.- X-Rays from the Sun?- A Fortuitous Discovery.- Filling up the Sky.- The Moon as Observing Assistant.- Rotating Blinders.- With Uhuru Toward New Frontiers.- Cygnus Cycles.- Magnetic Remote Sensing.- Einstein and EXOSAT.- ROSAT Odash Creating a Satellite.- A New Type of Detector.- A Key Experience.- Pulsars Odash Energy Beacons in the Universe.- The HEXE Balloon Program.- The Search for the Black Hole.- Contacts with Moscow.- ROSAT Odash The ROentgen SATellite Project.- Grazing Reflections.- Technical Preparations.- Difficult Production.- How to Glue Glass to Metal?- ROSAT Goes International.- Imaging of X-Rays.- An Artificial "Optic Nerve.- Building a Satellite.- Commands from Bavari.- Early Morning Shock.- The Most Accurate X-Ray Map.- Astro-Navigation for ROSAT.- X-Ray Astronomy in Our Galaxy.- X-Rays from a Comet.- X-Rays from the Moon.- The Demystification of the Sky.- The Sun as a Prototypical Star.- What Heats the Corona?.- The Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram.- Helpful Mass Screenings.- Magnetic Fields Determine.- X-Ray Luminosity.- ROSAT Registers Strongest X-Ray Burst.- X-Ray Views into Cosmic Delivery Rooms.- X-Rays from the Sirius System.- The End of a Solar-Type Star.- Consequences of Proximity.- The Source of the X-Rays.- Magnetic White Dwarfs.- A Mysterious Gap.- Exploding Stars.- Supernova 1987 A.- ROSAT's First Measurements.- The Fast Supernova 1993.- Galactic Supernovae.- A Stellar Explosion in the Stone Age.- Supersonic Stellar Debris.- Pulsars in X-Rays.- Revealing Cooling.- Enigma Geminga.- Classical X-Ray Binaries.- Difficult Search.- Black Holes.- The Particle Slingshot SS 433.- Impenetrable Clouds.- A Hot Neighborhood.- Bubbles in the Milky Way.- The Galactic Center.- Perhaps a Black Hole?- X-Ray Astronomy Outside Our Galaxy.- Our Nearest Neighbors.- Fusion Processes on the Surface.- A New X-Ray Pulsar.- Super-Bubbles in the LMC.- The 30 Doradus Complex.- The Andromeda Galaxy.- Starburst Galaxies.- Active Galaxies.- An End to the Confusing Variety.- Multispectral Cooperation.- Gigantic Energy Beacons.- Clusters of Galaxies.- A Deep View Through the Lockman Hole.- Epilogue.- List of Acronyms.- Index.