by Lucy Hawking
Venus
Light and How It Travels Through Space
The Drake Equation
Robotic Space Travel
Space Inventions
Binary Code
Manned Spaceflight
How Sound Travels Through Space
Titan
Satellites in Space
Alpha Centauri
55 Cancri
* * *
Acknowledgments
This book comes with our grateful thanks to:
Jane and Jonathan, without whose kindness and support this book would not exist. William, for his sweetness and good humor about his mom and grandad writing another book.
Garry Parsons, for his illustrations, which capture the story line, the adventure, and the characters so perfectly.
Geoff Marcy, for his amazing lecture at the Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge, which inspired the theme of this book.
The distinguished scientists who made their work accessible to a young audience through the essays that form The User’s Guide to the Universe. They are Bernard Carr, Seth Shostak, Brandon Carter, Martin Rees, and Geoff Marcy. Their expert knowledge and enthusiasm for this project made it a joy to work on.
Stuart Rankin at the University of Cambridge, for writing so brilliantly about how light and sound travel.
Our friends at NASA and all the people in the different departments who took the time and trouble to talk to us about what NASA does and how it works. In particular, we would like to thank Michael Griffin, Michael O’Brien, Michael Curie, and Bob Jacobs.
Kimberly Lievense and Marc Rayman at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, for their help with the wonders of robotic spaceflight.
Kip Thorne and Leonard Mlodinow at Caltech, for their advice and friendship.
Richard Garriott and Peter Diamandis at Space Adventures, for their energy and enthusiasm, and Richard for including us—and the first George book—in his real-life space adventure! Thanks to him, George’s Secret Key to the Universe has now visited the International Space Station.
Markus Poessel, for his attention to detail and helpful comment.
George Becker and Daniel Stark at the Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge, for their invaluable comments.
Sam Blackburn and Tom Kendall, for patiently answering endless quirky science, engineering, and computing questions.
Tif Loehnis and all at Janklow and Nesbit, UK, for their kindness and hard work on the George series. And Eric Simonoff in the New York office, for sending George to the United States once more.
At Random House, our wonderful editor Sue Cook, for her tremendous work, which brought the Cosmic Treasure Hunt together and made it into such a beautiful book. Lauren Buckland, for her great work on the text and the images; Sophie Nelson, for the careful copyedit; and James Fraser, for his wonderful front cover. Also Maeve Banham and her team in the Rights department, for helping to ensure that the George books truly do reach an international audience. And a special thank you to Annie Eaton, for her dedication and warmth toward the George series.
Keso Kendall, for her help with how a teenage supercomputer should speak.
All the “team”—at home and at the university—for their patience and generosity toward another George book.
Finally, but most importantly, we would like to thank our young readers—Melissa Ball, Poppy and Oscar Wallington, Anthony Redford, and Joanna Fox, for their thoughtful feedback and their very helpful comments on the Cosmic Treasure Hunt. And we would like to thank all the kids who asked the questions, who wrote, e-mailed, or came to lectures and were brave enough to stand up and ask something at the end. We hope this book gives you a few answers. And we hope you never stop asking “Why?”
Lucy and Stephen Hawking
About the Authors
LUCY HAWKING is the author of two novels for adults and has written for many newspapers as well as appearing on television and radio. Lucy has given popular talks on space travel and science for kids all around the world, including an address at one of NASA’s fiftieth-birthday celebrations. Lucy is the winner of the 2008 Sapio Award for Popularizing Science.
STEPHEN HAWKING is the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge. He is widely regarded as one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Einstein. His adult book A Brief History of Time has been a publishing sensation.
George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt is their second book together about George, Annie, Eric, and, of course, Cosmos.
About the Illustrator
GARRY PARSONS studied fine art at Canterbury and went on to study illustration at the University of Brighton. His work has won him several prizes, including the 2004 Red House Children’s Book Award for his picture book Billy’s Bucket. Garry lives in London.
Photographic Insert
© RIA NOVOSTI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Laika, the first living Earth-born creature in orbit.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Launch of the first U.S. manned space flight, May 1961.
© RIA NOVOSTI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Launch of the Soviet spacecraft, Vostok I, carrying Yuri Gagarin, April 1961.
© RIA NOVOSTI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Yuri Gagarin.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Gemini rendezvous: Gemini VI spacecraft photographed from Gemini VII, December 1965.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Gemini VII spacecraft photographed from Gemini VI, December 1965.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Extravehicular activity (EVA)—astronaut emerging from command module.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Footprint of Neil Armstrong’s first step on the Moon, July 21, 1969.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Apollo II astronaut Buzz Aldrin walking on the moon.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Apollo 15 astronaut James B. Irwin and lunar rover, July 1971.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Space shuttle simulator cockpit, 1999.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
First space shuttle launch, 1981. The shuttle was called Columbia.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Astronaut floating in the International Space Station (ISS).
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Astronauts making burgers aboard the ISS.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
ISS astronaut with fresh fruit in microgravity conditions.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
ISS with new solar panels, 2006.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
View of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, photographed from a U.S. space shuttle.
© DETLEV VAN RAVENSWAAY/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
SpaceShipOne, a private spacecraft, reentering the Earth’s atmosphere from orbit.
© CHRISTIAN DARKIN/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Computer artwork of SpaceShipOne, successfully launched into space in June 2004.
© SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Sir Isaac Newton’s own drawing of his reflecting telescope.
© DAVID PARKER/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Dome of the Isaac Newton Telescope, La Palma, Canary Islands.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Kalahari Desert, Namibia, as seen from space.
© JOHN CHUMACK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Leonid meteor shower.
© PEKKA PARVIAINEN/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
View from Earth of the planet Venus with the Moon.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Deployment of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) from the space shuttle Discovery, 1990.
© CANADA-FRANCE-HAWAII †TELESCOPE/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Colored optical image of the Rosette Nebula.
© ROBERT GENDLER/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Optical image of the Tarantula Nebula.
© NASA/STSCI/AURA/ESA/A. EVANS (UNIVERSITY O
F VIRGINIA, CHARLOTTESVILLE; NRAO; STONY BROOK UNIVERSITY)/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
HST image of colliding galaxies.
© ROBERT GENDLER/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Optical image of a whirlpool galaxy.
© JPL-CALTECH/STScI/VASSAR/NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Infrared composite image of colliding galaxies.
© NASA/ESA/STSCI/AURA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
HST image of a planetary nebula—a series of shells of gas cast off by a dying star.
© NASA/ESA/K. SAHU (STSCI)/SWEEPS SCIENCE TEAM/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
A starfield where gravitational wobbles show significant extrasolar planets.
© NASA/ESA/G. BACON (STSCI)/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Computer artwork of an extrasolar gas giant planet, orbiting a star in the constellation Vulpecula.
© NASA/JPL/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Computer artwork of the Voyager spacecraft.
© J NASA/JPL/UA/LOCKHEED MARTIN/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Computer artwork of the Phoenix spacecraft on Mars.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Image of the Chasma Boreale canyon on Mars.
© NASA/JHU-APL/CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON/ SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
The cratered surface of the planet Mercury.
© JNASA/JHU-APL/ASU/CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Craters on Mercury.
© JPL/NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Volcanoes on Venus.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Venus’s atmosphere.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Voyager 1 image of Jupiter.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Voyager 1 image of Saturn and its ring system.
© NASA/JPL/SSI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Cassini image of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, in front of Saturn.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Voyager 2 image of Uranus.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Voyager 2 image of Neptune with its largest moon, Triton, just visible.
© JPL/NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Voyager 2 image of Neptune.
© NASA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Earthrise over Moon, taken by U.S. astronauts on board Apollo 8, 1968.
It is one of the first images of the Earth seen from space.
© NASA/ESA/STSCI/AURA/J. BELL (CORNELL UNIVERSITY)/M. WOLFF (SPACE SCIENCE INSTITUTE, BOULDER)/ SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Mars close approach, taken by the HST, 2007.
© EUROPEAN SPACE AGENCY/DLR/FU BERLIN (G. NEUKUM)/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Martian erosion features.
© NASA/JPL-CALTECH/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA/TEXAS A AND M UNIVERSITY/ SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Phoenix lander image of ice on Mars.
© NASA/JPL/JHUAPL/MSSS/BROWN UNIVERSITY/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Color-enhanced satellite image of a Martian river delta.
© NASA/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA LUNAR AND PLANETARY LABORATORY/STSCI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
HST image of Titan’s surface, 1994. Top left is hemisphere facing Saturn, bottom right is hemisphere facing away from Saturn.
© NASA/JPL/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Cassini image of hydrocarbon lakes on Titan.
© NASA/JPL/U. ARIZONA/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Cassini image of surface features on Titan.
© NASA/ESA/E. KARKOSCHKA (UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA)/G. BACON (STSCI)/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
HST image of Titan orbiting Saturn, 1995.
© SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
X-ray image of Alpha Centauri, showing the two brightest stars in the system.
© LYNETTE COOK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Artwork of the planets and their orbits in the 55
© LYNETTE COOK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Artwork of extrasolar planet around 55 Cancri.
© KEVIN A HORGAN/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Earth from space, in true color, showing Europe and northern Africa.