For thousands of years, people pictured the sky as a giant dome surrounding the Earth. The stars were thought to be fixed to this dome, which slowly turned above us, much like the motion of the Sun, the Moon and the planets. This book tells the story of the scientific revolution that changed that picture forever—the moment humanity realized that the motions we see in the sky are only apparent motions, created by the Earth spinning on its axis and traveling around the Sun. The “celestial dome,” it turned out, was an illusion. It is the Earth—and the heavens—that move. This revolution began with Nicolaus Copernicus’s book On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres , published in 1543, just as the author was nearing the end of his life. The bold ideas in that book sent shockwaves through the scientific world and helped lay the foundations of modern physics. They also transformed the way people thought about nature—and about humanity’s place in the universe. This book follows the dramatic story of the Copernican Revolution and the long struggle to convince the world of its truth, from Galileo’s telescopic discoveries—made with a telescope he built himself—to the fierce scientific and religious debates that followed. The Copernican Revolution opened the door to an even bigger idea: The universe is vast, stretching far beyond our solar system. The “fixed stars,” we learned, are actually distant suns, so far away that they appear as tiny points of light. From there, it was only natural to wonder whether some of those stars might have planets of their own. At the end of the twentieth century—more than 400 years after Copernicus—astronomers finally discovered that planets are everywhere, orbiting stars across the galaxy. And who knows—perhaps some of those distant worlds may even host life.

Over the past two decades, advanced technologies and space missions have completely transformed our understanding of potential life beyond Earth. The resulting field, astrobiology, has become a multidisciplinary scientific discipline, encompassing many of the natural sciences and having implications for many areas of research. This book presents an introduction and overview of astrobiology. It deals with a wide range of fields, from the search for signs of life on planets in our solar system, to the discovery of exoplanets in distant solar systems and assessing the potential for life there. The book is based on the course of the same name that the author taught for more than two decades at the Hebrew University, and the course recorded on YouTube in the Cornerstones program , which has accumulated tens of thousands of views. The book is accessible not only to students of natural sciences, but to any reader who wants to learn about and understand the fascinating possibilities of life on other worlds.

Atlas of East Galilee Caves is published in a challenging period for the Upper Galilee, with hopes for a swift return to routine in this beautiful and region, bountiful with caves. The Atlas is published following studies and surveys conducted over the past decades. The boundaries of the area defined in the Atlas are the Hula Valley in the east, the border of Lebanon in the north and northwest, the sources of the streams flowing eastward in the west and the Issachar highlands in the south. The Atlas presents the basic data of the caves, and contains a concise multidisciplinary overview of what is known about them from a geological, historical, archaeological and biological point of view. The data is accompanied by plans and illustrations that expand the overall picture of each cave.

The book deals with geomorphological and soil aspects, plants, and animals (arthropods, reptiles, and rodents) of dunes on the coastal plain of Israel. The book has 11 chapters: structure and geomorphological processes of coastal dunes, soil formation processes, the characteristic of the largest coastal dune areas, flora and fauna (arthropods, reptiles, small mammals: rodents), the impact of man and climate changes on coastal dune ecosystems, ecological-economic losses due to the loss or fixation of coastal dunes, policy, planning, and conflicts between stakeholders, conservation and interface of coastal dunes. The book is a product of the vast knowledge accumulated over decades in detailed studies conducted by Prof. Pua Bar, together with many other researchers in the coastal dunes in Israel.

The book describes the Copernican Revolution, initiated by the publication of On the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres by Copernicus until it was accepted by the Scientific Community. The book follows the dramatic turns of the plot of the struggle for scientific truth, along with the conflict between the church and Galileo. Finally, the book brings the modern proofs for the Copernican model, including the very recent discoveries of extra-solar planets.

The book takes the reader on a journey of discovery ranging from the planets of our solar system to stars and distant solar systems in the Milky Way, our home galaxy, and beyond to the ends of the universe. It proposes a reader-friendly introduction to astrophysics and the physics of stars and planets, accompanied by over one hundred illustrations. The book explains concepts, distances and phenomena from other worlds, very different from our everyday experience. Throughout its journey through the universe the book introduces the science of astrobiology: the search for biological life in space. It also accompanies the course "Astrobiology and Life in the Universe" presented by the author and recorded for the benefit of the public in the "Cornerstones" program of the Hebrew University. The book deals with topics that have received widespread media coverage in recent years, such as NASA's research missions to Mars and their Kepler and James Web space telescopes. While the Kepler mission led in 2010-2015 to a breakthrough in discovering numerous worlds suitable for life outside the Solar System, James Web, whose launch is expected in 2021, will provide to humanity for the first time the ability to detect signs of life in these worlds.

The Golan Heights is the only place in Israel where many big and small volcanoes exist. It features various volcanic phenomenons, some of which were created in a long process and some in just a few hours. Since the Golan is "young" (geologically speaking), these phenomena are well preserved, almost without erosion or later cover. Furthermore, volcano eruptions are often shown on TV, so we have a chance to understand them better than other geological activities that are slower or take place in the sea or far deserts. In order to understand and be impressed by the wonderful manifestations of nature that used to be stormy and wild but today is accessible and still, we need a whole book that will tell us about everything that unites all these phenomena together and also explain each of them separately. But it is impossible to understand the Golan Volcanic phenomena without first understanding the whole volcanic procedures on planet Earth, in the depth of the ground at the bottom of oceans and in faraway galaxies. Unfortunately many people who hike in the Golan pass by many beautiful and rare sites without a clue about what they are missing. Therefore this book's purpose is to inform them about the immense variety of these wonderful phenomena with minimum effort. This is the reason why the book includes two parts: a general chapter called "An introduction to Volcanology "' and another chapter called "Volcanism in the Golan Heights". In order to enable the readers to understand the geological terms in the book, it also includes a dictionary of geological volcanological terms called " A word in the stone ", a bibliography and a list of the prominent volcanological sites in the Golan: almost all of them are near the road so they can be visited and enjoyed without risking entrance to difficult trails or old mine fields.

The book is designated for those how are interested in geology and are eager to understand the meaning of landscapes and views, especially in desert areas where rock formations are well exposed, such as the Negev. The Negev lays at the south of Israel and is part of the sub tropical deserts strip. The Northern Negev is characterized by a series of elongated mountain chains, trending north-east. This mountain chains are asymmetric anticlines and are part of the Syrian Arc- a long geological structure that extends from the western Sinai Peninsula at the south, to the Syrian Palmira Mountains at the north. Five east- west long shear zones cross the central part of the Negev. A series of typical strike-slip related structures evolved along those dextral faults, such as domes, half domes, and pull- aparts . The Dead Sea Transform Fault bounds the Negev at the east; The international border with Egypt is the western border; The Gulf of Eilat (Aqaba golf) delineates the Negev at the south, and the Be'er Sheva Vvalley lays at its northern border. The Igneous rocks of the Precambrian Arabo - Nubian shield build the basement of the stratigraphic column. The Arabo -Nubian shield is composed of three rock complexes: The complex of the archaic metamorphic rocks, the magmatic complex, and the volcanic conglomeratic complex. A relatively thin, up to 1,200 m sedimentary rock sequence covers the basement at the south of the Negev, near Eilat. The sedimentary formations consistently become thicker and reach up to 5,000 m in the northern part of the Negev- about 200 km from Eilat. Among the unique geological phenomena of the Negev, one can count the Dead Sea Rift Valley, the three huge erosion- circuses ("Machteshim"), and the transversal creeks, which cross the anticlines from one side to the other. The book describes systematically each of the rock formations, their composition, and the environmental conditions at the time, as well as explains the natural processes that led to the formation of the landscape that we see today.

Most of us suspect that climate change is happening, but is it a terrible threat to our world or an exaggerated beat up? Or is it something in between - an issue that humanity must eventually face, but not yet? In this groundbreaking and essential new book, Tim Flannery argues passionately for the urgent need to address - NOW - the implications of a global climate change that is damaging all life on earth and endangering our very survival. This book is unimpeachable in its authority, deftly and accessibly written in its vision for what each of us can do to avoid catastrophe. It is a global call to arms, laying out plainly if not controversially what we know, what we think might happen, and what tools we have available to us to make a difference. The Weather Makers will change your life. It is a difficult subject and hard for people to evaluate dispassionately because it entails deep political and industrial implications, and because it arises from the very core processes of our civilisation's success. Right now our fate is in our hands, for we are the weather makers and we already possess the tools required to avoid catastrophic climate change.

Despite its small size, only 22,000 km, Israel displays an impressive ecological diversity. This stems from its unique bio-geographic location; a bridge between the desert belt (Sahara-Arabia) and the Mediterranean region, with corridors to the dry topics via the rift valley and to the heights of central Asia through the northern mountain chain. The region has experienced a series of drastic climate changes in the last 20,000 years that have introduced, and eliminated, species from all these regions. Israel is also one of the major bird migration route between Europe and Africa. Topography varies sharply, from the mountain tops in the north (~ 2000 m) to the Dead Sea (~ -400 m). The precipitation gradient ranges from 900 mm in the upper northern region to about 10 mm at Eilat in the far south. Within this limited area, rock-soil diversity is also high, contributing to the richness of habitats and niches. However, nature conservation in modern Israel is not an easy task. High population density along with a high habitat fragmentation rate, intensive agriculture, allocation of most natural water sources for human use and designation of extensive sections of open space for army training, pose serious threats to the local fauna and flora. This Red Book of the endangered vertebrates of Israel is an important tool in the endless task of preserving the unique faunal diversity of the country. The authors are experts on the systematic group they cover and rely on field data gathered in the last 50 years. The book was prepared according to IUCN instructions. We hope that it will help to improve conservation of the biological assets of Israel.