Helen Czerski – författare

Jordens hav skapar liv och enorma flöden av energi. I Det stora blå skildrar oceanografen Helen Czerski mekanismerna bakom denna livets blå motor. Hon tar med läsaren på en resa från havsbottnens djup till tropiska korallrev, från flodmynningar till Arktis isflak. Helen Czerski förklarar hur vattentemperatur, salthalt, gravitation och rörelser hos de tektoniska plattorna samspelar i en komplex dans. Hon berättar om historia, kultur och människans färder över haven - om de budbärare som rörde sig med vind och strömmar och som navigerade haven genom att läsa vågor och sikta mot stjärnor. Hon skildrar också havsdjupens märkliga invånare, som exempelvis grönlandshajen, som kan leva i hundratals år.Framför allt avslöjar Czerski att, även om havsmotorn har skapt förutsättningar för liv i tusentals år, står havet idag inför akuta hot. Genom att förstå hur havet fungerar och ser vilken avgörande roll det har för oss och världen kan vi lära oss att skydda denna blå moto. Denna enastående och prisbelönta bok ger ett nytt perspektiv på vad det innebär att vara medborgare på planeten havet.

WINNER OF THE 2024 WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR CONSERVATION FINANCIAL TIMES 2023 HIGHLIGHT'Helen Czerski weaves together physics and biology, history and science, in a beautifully poetic way.'Professor Alice Roberts'In Helen Czerski's hands, the mechanical becomes magical. An instant classic.'Tristan Gooley, author of How to Read Water'Blue Machine is quite simply one of the best books I have ever read.'Dr George McGavin, zoologist, entomologist and broadcaster'A fascinating dive into the essential engine that drives our world. Czerski brings the oceans alive with compelling stories that masterfully navigate this most complex system.'Gaia Vince, science journalist, broadcaster and author of Nomad Century All of the Earth's ocean, from the equator to the poles, is a single engine powered by sunlight - a blue machine.Earth is home to a huge story that is rarely told - that of our ocean. Not the fish or the dolphins, but the massive ocean engine itself: what it does, why it works, and the many ways it has influenced animals, weather and human history & culture.In a book that will recalibrate our view of this defining feature of our planet, physicist Helen Czerski dives deep to illuminate the murky depths of the ocean engine, examining the messengers, passengers and voyagers that live in it, travel over it, and survive because of it. From the ancient Polynesians who navigated the Pacific by reading the waves to permanent residents of the deep such as the Greenland shark that can live for hundreds of years, she explains the vast currents, invisible ocean walls and underwater waterfalls that all have their place in the ocean's complex, interlinked system.Timely, elegant and passionately argued, Blue Machine presents a fresh perspective on what it means to be a citizen of an ocean planet. The understanding it offers is crucial to our future. Drawing on years of experience at the forefront of marine science, Helen Czerski captures the magnitude and subtlety of Earth's defining feature, showing us the thrilling extent to which we are at the mercy of this great engine.

Part of the new Ladybird Expert series, Bubbles is a clear, surprising and entertaining introduction to the science of bubbles. Bubbles are beautiful, ephemeral, fun, fragile, jolly and slightly unpredictable. We're all familiar with them, but we don't often ask what they actually are. The great scientists of the Western world - Robert Hooke, Isaac Newton, Lord Rayleigh and more - studied bubbles seriously. They recognised that they had a lot to say about the nature of the physical world, and they poked, prodded and listened to find out what it was. In the years since, we've learned that this bulbous arrangement of liquid and gas does things that neither the gas or the liquid could do by itself. Written by the celebrated physicist and oceanographer Helen Czerski, Bubbles explores how everything from the way drinks taste to the Earth's temperature are influenced by bubbles. This book has a message: never underestimate a bubble!Written by the leading lights and most outstanding communicators in their fields, the Ladybird Expert books provide clear, accessible and authoritative introductions to subjects drawn from science, history and culture.For an adult readership, the Ladybird Expert series is produced in the same iconic small hardback format pioneered by the original Ladybirds. Each beautifully illustrated book features the first new illustrations produced in the original Ladybird style for nearly forty years.

'A quite delightful book on the joys, and universality, of physics. Czerski's enthusiasm is infectious because she brings our humdrum everyday world to life, showing us that it is just as fascinating as anything that can be seen by the Hubble Telescope or created at the Large Hadron Collider.' - Jim Al-KhaliliOur world is full of patterns. If you pour milk into your tea and give it a stir, you'll see a swirl, a spiral of two fluids, before the two liquids mix completely. The same pattern is found elsewhere too. Look down on the Earth from space, and you'll find similar swirls in the clouds, made where warm air and cold air waltz. In Storm in a Teacup, Helen Czerski links the little things we see every day with the big world we live in. Each chapter begins with something small - popcorn, coffee stains and refrigerator magnets - and uses it to explain some of the most important science and technology of our time. This is physics as the toolbox of science - a toolbox we need in order to make sense of what is around us and arrive at decisions about the future, from medical advances to solving our future energy needs. It is also physics as the toy box of science: physics as fun, as never before.