“Good corporate drama . . . an enlightening narrative of how new communications infrastructures often come about.” —The Economist, “A Book of the Year 2016” In the early 1990s, Motorola developed a revolutionary satellite system called Iridium that promised to be its crowning achievement. Its constellation of 66 satellites in polar orbit was a mind-boggling technical accomplishment, surely the future of communication. The only problem was that Iridium the company was a commercial disaster. Only months after launching service, it was $11 billion in debt, burning through $100 million a month and crippled by baroque rate plans and agreements that forced calls through Moscow, Beijing, Fucino, Italy, and elsewhere. Bankruptcy was inevitable—the largest to that point in American history. And when no real buyers seemed to materialize, it looked like Iridium would go down as just a “science experiment.” That is, until Dan Colussy got a wild idea. Colussy, a former head of Pan-Am now retired and working on his golf game in Palm Beach, heard about Motorola’s plans to “de-orbit” the system and decided he would buy Iridium and somehow turn around one of the biggest blunders in the history of business. Impeccably researched and wonderfully told, Eccentric Orbits is a rollicking, unforgettable tale of technological achievement, business failure, the military-industrial complex, and one of the greatest deals of all time. “Deep reporting put forward with epic intentions . . . a story that soars and jumps and dives and digresses . . . [A] big, gutsy, exciting book.” —The Wall Street Journal, “A Top 10 Nonfiction Book of 2016” “Spellbinding . . . A tireless researcher, Bloom delivers a superlative history . . . A tour de force.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

THE BEGINNING OF LIFE AWAITS AT THE END OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM. A FROZEN ANSWER AT THE EDGE OF PLANETARY SPACE Set to embark on NASA’s first expedition to the outer planets, the crew of the spacecraft Magellan learns someone else has beaten them by a few decades: a top-secret Soviet project codenamed Arkangel. Now during their long race to the Kuiper Belt, astronauts Jack Templeton and Traci Keene must unwind a decades-old mystery buried in the pages of a dead cosmonaut’s journal. The solution will challenge their beliefs about the nature of humanity, and will force the astronauts to confront the question of existence itself. And the final answer lies at the edge of the Solar System, waiting to change everything. At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management). About Farside by Patrick Chiles: "The situations are realistic, the characters interesting, the perils harrowing, and the stakes could not be higher...The story is one of problem solving, adventure, survival, improvisation, and includes one of the most unusual episodes of space combat in all of science fiction. It would make a terrific movie."— John Walker, Ricochet.com "...a fast-paced and exciting story which bounces between the borders of technological thriller and science fiction...Farside is an impressive effort."—Mark Lardas, The Galveston County Daily News

Marshall Hunter only wanted to fly: the faster, the higher, the better. But a life of rescuing wayward spacefarers and derelict satellites in the cislunar cruiser U.S.S. Borman is far from the adventure he’d imagined. But his fortunes change when a billionaire couple goes missing on their way to a near-Earth asteroid. Out of contact and on a course that will eventually send them crashing into Mars, the nuclear-powered Borman is dispatched on an audacious, high-speed interplanetary run to bring the couple home. As they approach the asteroid, however, the Borman itself becomes hopelessly disabled. With the Borman suddenly out of commission and far beyond reach, cislunar space begins falling into chaos as critical satellites fail and valuable lunar mineral shipments begin disappearing in transit. Nothing is as it seems, and Marshall Hunter and the rest of the crew suspect none of it is by coincidence. At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management). About Frozen Orbit: “. . . hard science fiction and an entertaining and gripping plot. . . . Chiles nails the atmosphere of a NASA-run human spaceflight mission in the 21st century, the jargon of the mission controllers and astronauts, and the bureaucratic infighting characterizing today’s NASA. . . . The scenario and background . . . are the scaffolding on which a gripping tale is formed. Readers experience the wonder the astronauts feel on a remarkable voyage, groan as the Earth goes crazy as the expedition progresses, and thrill to a powerful conclusion . . . science fiction at its best.”—The Galveston County Daily News About Farside by Patrick Chiles: “The situations are realistic, the characters interesting, the perils harrowing, and the stakes could not be higher."— John Walker, Ricochet.com “. . . a fast-paced and exciting story that bounces between the borders of technological thriller and science fiction. . . . an impressive effort."—The Galveston County Daily News

This useful resource deals with satellite orbits, showing how the wide range of available orbits can be used in communications, positioning, remote-sensing, meteorology, and astronomy.

Fifty years after Sputnik, artificial satellites have become indispensable monitors in many areas, such as economics, meteorology, telecommunications, navigation and remote sensing. The specific orbits are important for the proper functioning of the satellites. This book discusses the great variety of satellite orbits, both in shape (circular to highly elliptical) and properties (geostationary, Sun-synchronous, etc.). This volume starts with an introduction into geodesy. This is followed by a presentation of the fundamental equations of mechanics to explain and demonstrate the properties for all types of orbits. Numerous examples are included, obtained through IXION software developed by the author. The book also includes an exposition of the historical background that is necessary to help the reader understand the main stages of scientific thought from Kepler to GPS. This book is intended for researchers, teachers and students working in the field of satellite technology. Engineers, geographers and all those involved in space exploration will find this information valuable. Michel Capderou’s book is an essential treatise in orbital mechanics for all students, lecturers and practitioners in this field, as well as other aerospace systems engineers. —Charles Elachi, Director, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

The many papers by Soviet authors have been translated into English by A. P. Kirillov, N. A. Nikiforova, E. A. Voronov, and others. Some of the papers were trans lated by the authors themselves. The discussion records have been prepared at the Institute for Theoretical Astronomy by V. K. Abalakin, N. A. Belyaev, A. P. Kirillov, V. A. Shor, E. A. Voronov, N. S. Yakhontova, and others. The three papers published in French have been carefully checked by B. Milet. The final editing has been done at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, and we thank J. H. Clark, P. D. Gregory, J. E. Kervick, and G. Warren for retyping much of the material. Our special thanks are due to the D. Reidel Publishing Company for the excellent care they have taken in printing these proceedings of IAU Symposium No. 45. G. A. CHEBOT AREV E. I. KAZIMIRCHAK-POLONSKA Y A B. G. MARSDEN INTRODUCTION The idea to organize a Symposium on 'The Motion, Evolution of Orbits, and Origin of Comets' dates back to the IAU thirteenth General Assembly, held in 1967 in Prague. Owing to the impossibility of completing during the General Assembly the discussion on the problem of orbital evolution of comets Professor G. A. Chebotarev, then the newly elected President of IAU Commission 20, initiated the organization of the international symposium in Leningrad where the full scope of cometary problems might be considered from the viewpoint of celestial mechanics.

Owing to its simple formulation and intractable nature, along with its application to the lunar theory, the three-body problem has since it was first studied by Newton in the Principia attracted the attention of many of the world's most gifted mathematicians and astronomers. Two of these, Euler and Lagrange, discovered the problem's first periodic solutions. However, it was not until Hill's discovery in the late 1870s of the variational orbit that the importance of the periodic solutions was fully recognized, most notably by Poincaré, but also by others such as Sir George Darwin. The book begins with a detailed description of the early history of the three-body problem and its periodic solutions, with chapters dedicated to the pioneering work of Hill, Poincaré, and Darwin. This is followed by the first in-depth account of the contribution to the subject by the mathematical astronomer Forest Ray Moulton and his research students at the University of Chicago. The author reveals how Moulton's Periodic Orbits, published in 1920 and running to some 500 pages, arose from Moulton's ambitious goal of creating an entirely new lunar theory. The methods Moulton developed in the pursuit of this goal are described and an examination is made of both the reception of his work and his legacy for future generations of researchers.