At the Second International A D Sakharov Conference on Physics, more than 200 physicists from many countries gathered together to celebrate what would have been the 75th birthday of the distinguished physicist and world figure Andrei Sakharov. This tradition had begun five years earlier, soon after his death.The conference was unique: it brought together leading scientists working in seemingly different fields, which were nevertheless among Sakharov's interests. Participants discussed the status and perspectives of research in high-energy physics, cosmology, astrophysics, classical and quantum gravity, plasma physics, nuclear physics, and extreme states of matter. The conference provided a unique opportunity for the participants to find and discuss common points of interest. The proceedings are evidence of the great variety of topics.Talks were given by distinguished physicists such as S Drell, L Okun, R Wilson, A D Linde, C W Misner, N A Popov, S L Adler, B DeWitt, M Kaku, J H Schwarz, A Zamolodchikov and E S Fradkin.
The purpose of NATO: From Regional to Global Security Provider is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the Alliance’s new vision (the new Strategic Concept) and common security impact – associated tasks to be undertaken within a short and longer term time horizon. The book serves as a relevant and timely study of the most pressing issues facing NATO today – including recent lessons gained. It provides recommendations for consideration and further discussion (i.e., the “what” and the “how” regarding future policy options for the North Atlantic Alliance). The intended audience includes international security policy-makers, government officials, elected leaders, academics, interested professionals, civil society and members of the public. Specifically, the book focuses on six topic areas. Part I, the Introduction, relates to conceptual and organizational changes, membership expansion and enlargement. Part II consists of emerging security challenges, including terrorism, piracy, homeland threats, cyber defense and information warfare, energy security, non-proliferation and countering WMD. Part III incorporates national and regional challenges such as the Balkans, Iraq, Afghanistan/Pakistan, the Horn of Africa, North Africa and the Middle East. Part IV deals with military and non-military assets. It integrates capability development, burden sharing, common funding, ballistic missile defenses and the phased adaptive approach, non-strategic nuclear weapons, and a broad-based comprehensive approach to security. Part V covers multifaceted collaborative relationships between NATO and various governmental, inter-governmental, and non-governmental bodies. This section incorporates outreach and engagement with Russia, India, Pakistan, and China, as well as with other non-NATO countries, the Mediterranean Dialogue (MD), and the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI). Formal and informal linkages with the EU, OSCE, and the UN are also essential features of such a cooperative activity. Additionally, the expanding participation of civil society and growing involvement of new key NATO interlocutors (e.g., NGOs, academics) have created new international partnering opportunities as a means of bolstering global security through innovative public-private partnerships. Part VI includes a Summary and Conclusions.
This book tells captivating stories of misadventures of two renowned theoretical physicists in the Soviet Union. The first part is devoted to Friedrich (Fritz) Houtermans, an outstanding Dutch-Austrian-German physicist who was the first to suggest that the source of stars' energy is thermonuclear fusion, and also made a number of other important contributions to cosmochemistry and geochemistry. In 1935, Houtermans, a German communist, in an attempt to save his life from Hilter's Gestapo, fled to the Soviet Union. He took up an appointment at the Kharkov Physico-Technical Institute, working there for two years with the Russian physicist Valentin P Fomin. In the Great Purge of 1937, Houtermans was arrested in December by the NKVD (Soviet Secret Police, KGB's predecessor). He was tortured, and confessed to being a Trotskyist plotter and German spy, out of fear of threats against his wife Charlotte. However, Charlotte had already escaped from the Soviet Union to Denmark, after which she went to England and finally the USA. As a result of the Hilter-Stalin Pact of 1939, Houtermans was turned over to the Gestapo in May 1940 and imprisoned in Berlin.The second part consists of two essays that narrate the life story of Yuri Golfand, one of the codiscoverers of supersymmetry, a major discovery in theoretical physics in the 20th century. In 1973, just two years after the publication of his seminal paper, he was fired from the Lebedev Physics Institute in Moscow. Because of his Jewish origin he could find no job. Under such circumstances, he applied for an exit visa to Israel, but his application was denied. Yuri Golfand became a refusnik and joined the Human rights movement, along with two other prominent physicists, Andrei Sakharov and Yuri Orlov. To earn his living, he had to do manual work, repeatedly being intimidated by KGB. Only 18 years later, shortly before the demise of the Soviet Union, did he obtain permission to leave the country, emigrating to Israel in 1990.These personal life stories of two outstanding theorists are interwined with the tragedies of the 20th century and make for compelling reading.
Introduces the physics of black holes and the methods employed in it, and reviews the main results of this branch of physics. Frolov (physics, U. of Alberta) and Novikov (theoretical astrophysics, U. of Copenhagen) focus on questions that have been answered relatively recently. Among the topics treated are: space-time of stationary black holes, general theory of black holes, black hole perturbations, numerics, electrodynamics, black holes in unified theories of gravity, quantum black holes, final states of evaporating black holes, and the information loss puzzle. Special attention is paid to the role of black holes in astrophysics and observational evidence of black hole existence. Many exotic subjects linked with black holes, such as white holes, wormholes, and time machines, are discussed. Appendices cover mathematical aspects of general relativity and black holes and quantum field theory in curved spacetime. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
