From where--and what--does water come? How did it become the key to life? This book presents a state-of-the-art portrait of the science of water, recounting how the oxygen needed to form H2O originated in the interiors of stars, asking whether microcomets may be replenishing our oceans, and explaini...

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Bibliographic Details

Main Author:	Kandel, Robert (Author)
Format:	Book
Language:	English French
Published:	New York Columbia University Press 2003
Subjects:	Oorsprong Water Wasser Wasserkreislauf Wasserversorgung
Summary:	From where--and what--does water come? How did it become the key to life? This book presents a state-of-the-art portrait of the science of water, recounting how the oxygen needed to form H2O originated in the interiors of stars, asking whether microcomets may be replenishing our oceans, and explaining how the Moon and planets set ice-age rhythms. The book then takes the measure of water today in all its states, solid and gaseous as well as liquid. How do El Niño and La Niña events affect our weather? What clues can water provide to climate changes of the past, and how does it complicate predictions of future global warming? Finally, the book deals with the role of water in the rise and fall of civilizations. As nations grapple over watershed rights and pollution controls, water is poised to supplant oil as the most contested natural resource of the new century.--From publisher description.
Physical Description:	xiii, 312 p. ill., maps
ISBN:	0231122446