This definitive guide provides advanced students and researchers with a detailed yet accessible overview of all of the central topics of meteor science. Leading figures from the field summarise their active research on themes ranging from the physical composition of meteoroids to the most recent optical and radar observations and ongoing theoretical developments. Crucial practical issues are also considered, such as the risk posed by meteoroids - to spacecraft, and on the ground - and future avenues of research are explored. Taking advantage of the latest dynamical models, insights are offered into meteor flight phenomena and the evolution of meteoroid streams and complexes, as well as describing the in-depth laboratory analysis of recovered material. The rapid rate of progress in twenty-first-century research makes this volume essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand how recent developments broaden our understanding of meteors, meteoroids and their origins.

Examines how asteroids and meteoroids came to be, what they're made of, where most of them are found, and what happens when they collide with planets.

Climb Aboard! Explore the difference between meteor, meteorite, and meteoroid! Investigate comet composition and development and their observation through history! Learn about asteroids! Learn about key astronomers tools such as telescopes and the Deep Impact spacecraft! See an infographic showing a comet's orbit! Did You Know? facts and a Guidebook of Near Earth Objects complete your journey. Aligned to Common Core standards and correlated to state standards. Checkerboard Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.

The space shuttle orbiter has already been struck many times by small meteoroids and orbital debris, but it has not been damaged severely. There is a real risk, however, that a meteoroid or debris impact could one day force the crew to abort a mission or might result in loss of life or loss of the shuttle itself. Protecting the Space Shuttle from Meteoroids and Orbital Debris assesses the magnitude of the problem and suggests changes that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration can make to reduce the risk to the shuttle and its crew. December

This rigorously refereed volume is a compilation of articles that summarize the most recent results in meteor, meteoroid and related fields presented at the Meteoroids 2007 conference held at the impressive CosmoCaixa Science Museum in Barcelona, Spain.

Determination of armor thickness necessary for meteoroid protection.

The genesis of modern searches for observable meteoritic phenomena on the Moon is the paper by Lincoln La Paz in Popular Astronomy magazine in 1938. In it he argued that the absence of observed fashes of meteoritic impacts on the Moon might be interpreted to mean that these bodies are destroyed as luminous meteors in an extremely rarefed lunar atmosphere. The paper suggested the possibility of systematic searches for such possible lunar meteors. With these concepts in mind, I was surprised to note a transient moving bright speck on the Moon on July 10, 1941. It appeared to behave very much as a lunar meteor would – except that the poorly estimated duration would lead to a strongly hyperbolic heliocentric velocity. Thus, the idea of systematic searches for both p- sible lunar meteors and meteoritic impact fashes was born. It was appreciated that much time might need to be expended to achieve any positive results. Systematic searches were carried out by others and myself chiefy in the years 1945–1965 and became a regular program at the newly founded Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers, or ALPO.

Modern computer power and high-precision observational data have greatly improved the reliability of meteoroid stream models. At present, scientific research calls for two kinds of models: precise ones for individual streams, and statistically averaged ones for Solar System dust distribution models. Thus, there is a wide field of study open to stream modellers. This brief describes step-by-step computer simulations of meteoroid stream formation and evolution. Detailed derivations of relevant formulae are given, along with plenty of helpful, digestible figures explaining the subtleties of the method. Each theoretical section ends with examples aimed to help readers practice and master the material. Most of the examples are based on the Geminid meteoroid stream model, which has been developed by the author in the last 30 years. The book is intended for researchers interested in meteor astronomy and mathematical modelling, and it is also accessible to physics and astrophysics students.