From Dust to Life: The Origin and Evolution of Our Solar System, John Chambers and Jacqueline Mitton, Princeton U. Press, 2014. $29.95 (299 pp.). ISBN 978-0-691-14522-8
From Dust to Life: The Origin and Evolution of Our Solar System by John Chambers and Jacqueline Mitton is a welcome addition, indeed the best book I know of, for general readers interested in the history of the solar system and its future prospects. It is up to date, light, engaging, and packed with the latest information and ideas about this exciting topic—all without being pedantic.
Chambers is a leading expert on solar system origin; Mitton is a successful and highly experienced writer, accomplished in bringing space science topics to the public—as she does with coauthor Ralph Lorenz in Titan Unveiled: Saturn’s Mysterious Moon Explored (Princeton University Press, 2008). Nonscientists may appreciate that no equations appear in Chambers and Mitton’s book. However, the authors’ explanations of complex topics are sometimes lengthy, and the technically and math savvy may be disappointed with the lack of detail.
Humans have always been interested in how our solar system—and for modern humans, how other solar systems—came to be. The authors provide a detailed history of thinking on the subject, share the best current answers, and highlight unknowns, uncertainties, and disagreements. They describe the nebular hypothesis, our current best paradigm for solar-system formation: that the Sun and planets arose together from a swirling cloud of gas and dust. And they clearly show the contributions that laboratory work, space and ground observations, and numerical modeling have made toward establishing that consensus view.
Because From Dust to Life has no scientific jargon, technical terms, or equations, it reads more like an archaeological survey than an astronomy textbook. Students and specialists will not find many surprises here. They will, however, find that the book is packed with information, including introductions to the key players, past and present, and their contributions. It could therefore be a useful supplement for students in astronomy and physics classes.
Nonexpert readers will learn that the comet–asteroid distinction is fuzzy; that hot Jupiters, a class of extrasolar planets, can be partly explained by planet migration; and that the asteroid Vesta is a minor planet. They will also learn that numerical models are only as good as the data available and that no single object can be the Rosetta stone of planetary science.
Other topics treated in the book include the evolution of the asteroid belt; the Yarkovsky effect, a force acting on a rotating body in space due to anisotropic emission of thermal photons; and the Nice model, which describes the migration of giant planets. That model also provides an explanation for many of the rocky planets’ features. Some of those features were created during the so-called late heavy bombardment, a cataclysm of impacts about 4 billion years ago, whose record is preserved in the Moon’s craters.
The book includes chapters on planetary nurseries, the origin of the Moon, the giant planets, and Earth as the cradle of life. It does not indulge in speculation about extraterrestrial life; rather, it describes the so-called habitable zone around a star, where an orbiting planet’s surface temperature would be suitable for liquid water, the minimum requirement for life on Earth (and possibly other planets). Chapters contain lots of details about meteorites and also capsule descriptions of each planet.
I particularly enjoyed the discussions on how scientists determine the ages of Earth, the Moon, and the Sun, and the changing roles that planetesimals (solid-particle aggregations) have played in our understanding of solar-system formation. The very latest developments presented at recent conferences also show the role of small “pebbles” in multiple aspects of planet formation.
The book also clarifies some misconceptions. For example, it points out some failings of Charles Lyell’s concept of uniformitarianism, the view that Earth has changed gradually and continually over time; it notes that Pierre Simon Laplace, the early developer of the nebular hypothesis, was not completely correct when he stated, “The system of the world only oscillates about a mean state”; and it asserts that only a few lucky protoplanets have survived to become terrestrial planets.
Multiple black-and-white figures, including some space photographs, help clarify the text. The authors include a comprehensive index and a useful glossary of technical terms. Those features add to an already accessible book. From Dust to Life is a must-read for anyone who wants to know how the solar system came to be.
Correction: Updated 4 February 2015. The late heavy bombardment period occurred 4 billion years ago.
Larry Esposito is a professor of astrophysical and planetary sciences at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, University of Colorado Boulder. He conducts research on planetary rings and is principal investigator for experiments involving the Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph aboard the Cassini spacecraft, which has been in orbit around Saturn since 2004.
