Alan W. HirshfeldAlan W. Hirshfeld is Professor of Physics at the University of Massachusetts - Dartmouth and an Associate of the Harvard College Observatory. He received his undergraduate degree in astrophysics from Princeton University in 1973 and his PhD in astronmy from Yale University in 1978. He is the author of two widely praised books: Parallax: The Race to Measure the Cosmos, which chronicles the human stories involved in the centuries-long quest to measure the first distance to a star; and The Electric Life of Michael Faraday, a biography of the 19th century pioneer of electricity and magnetism. His writings have appeared in numerous magazines and he has lectured at educational institutions nationwide about scientific history and discovery. Read More Read Less