Astrophyics Degree: What Books to Read?

[matt_crouch]

im hopefully starting uni next year and doing a degree in astrophysics can anyone recommend any useful books cheers

 

[ps2138]

my intro course was taught with this (though we used the 1st edition) and I thought it was a fairly good:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0805304029/?tag=pfamazon01-20

This is a popular book for an intro to cosmology:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0805389121/?tag=pfamazon01-20

I don't think either of the books assume much at all in terms of a maths background (just calculus i think).

 

[malawi_glenn]

I agree with the first book which ps2138 recommended, that's all you need to get started with astrophysics basically :-) However some knowledge in basic physics is assumed in that book.

 

[matt_crouch]

ye cheers guys.. I'm doing A-level and physics and maths so should be ok

cheers =]

 

[malawi_glenn]

The book is 1400pages, so it covers everything from celestial mechanics to stellar atmospheres to black holes to cosmology. The bad thing is that pictures are in black and white =/

 

[ps2138]

Just a note though--the first edition of ostlie and caroll is probably pretty outdated on certain topics at this point. I used it several years ago and even then there were areas where it wasn't abreast of new developments (this is to be expected considering how much research is continually being done). You'll probably want to get the newest edition or you might end up stuck thinking we've only discovered a dozen or so exoplanets or that Pluto is still a planet!