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All branches of astrophysics are encompassed in this book, from the largest scales and cosmology to the solar system and the Sun, through the galaxies and the stars, including a section on astronomical instrumentation. Experts from across the world ´speak´ in a single book about the most recent, exciting results from their fields. A CD-ROM accompanies the book opening a panorama of astrophysics today.

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Preface Committees Cosmic Microwave Background; Enrique Martínez-González and Patricio Vielva The Gravitational Lensing Effect in Cosmology; Genevieve Soucail The PLANCK Mission; J.A. Tauber Surveys of Extragalactic Sources with Planck; G. De Zotti, C. Burigana, M. Negrello, S. Tinti and R. Ricci, L. Silva, J. Gonzalez-Nuevo and L. Toffolatti New Physics in Clusters of Galaxies; M. Douspis Emission Line Galaxies in Clusters; Bianca M. Poggianti Active Galactic Nuclei and Surveys: the View from the New X-ray Observatories; X. Barcons Star-Forming Complexes in Galaxies; Bruce G. Elmegreen Star Formation and Infrared Emission in Galaxies; Nikolaos D. Kylafis and Angelos Misiriotis Evolution of the MilkyWay Disk; B. Nordström, J. Andersen Massive Stars in the Galactic Center; F. Najarro The Mass Spectrum of X-Ray Binaries; Jorge Casares Massive Stars in Starbursts; Alan Pedlar The Hot Content of Planetary Nebulae; Martin A. Guerrero, You-Hua Chu and Robert A. Gruendl The Hidden Life of Massive Stars; A. Lenorzer, A. Bik, M. R. Mokiem, A. de Koter, L. Kaper, L.B.F.M. Waters What can we learn about the Sun from observations in the near ultraviolet? Achim Gandorfer Our Magnetic Sun; E.R. Priest Moist Convective Storms in the Atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn; Ricardo Hueso and Agustín Sánchez-Lavega Exploring the Solar System beyond Neptune; Jose L. Ortiz and Pablo Santos-Sanz Planet Detection with Large Telescopes and Interferometry; Andreas Quirrenbach AVO First Science; Mark G. Allen, Paolo Padovani, Piero Rosati, Nicholas A. Walton Euro50: A European 50 m Adaptive OpticsExtremely Large Telescope; Arne Ardeberg and Torben Andersen

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