Customer Reviews

Stellar Structure and Evolution (Astronomy and Astrophysics Library)

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Kippenhahn and Weigert is a must to anyone who wants to do serious astrophysics. It's one of the most comprehensive books I've read on the subject, although some basic astronomy concepts are supposed to have been already assimilated.

It starts from the very basic equations of a star and goes through all the underlying fundamental processes till the final stages of stellar evolution. The models of the stellar structure, of the physical processes that occur in the interior of stars and of the stellar evolution are explained in great detail and in a simple and elegant manner.

But don't be fooled: this is a book for physicists. Although the theory is very well explained, some parts of the calculations are omited. The whole book is focused on the practical aspects, always with a lot of physical intuition (which can be seen in the several comparisons made with the numerical models). As the authors are pioneers in some of the models presented, this is a very rich and detailed work.

I used this book as the recommended text in an astrophysics course, in my 4th as an undergraduate physics student. The book covers more than one semester (about one and a half) and it's a complete introduction to astrophysics. The book does not cover some of the more recent and complicated models: it focuses on the simpler ones. Nevertheless, it's a good starting point to choose your field inside astrophysics, and a very good reference book to anyone doing research.