'David Gray's book puts the decades of the author's hands-on experience, combined with his scientific ingenuity, into a form that students and young researcher love. Clearly, David Gray's book has evolved. The Fourth Edition is not just a graduate student's textbook, it is now also an up-to-date window into practical stellar astrophysical research. As in the past, all my graduate students will get it as their bible.' Prof. Klaus G. Strassmeier, University of Potsdam, and Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics, Germany
Preface to the first edition; Preface to the second edition; Preface to the third edition; Preface to the fourth edition; 1. Background; 2. Fourier transforms; 3. Spectroscopic tools; 4. Light detectors; 5. Radiation terms and definitions; 6. The black body and its radiation; 7. Energy transport in stellar photospheres; 8. The continuous absorption coefficient; 9. The model photosphere; 10. Analysis of stellar continua; 11. The line absorption coefficient; 12. The measurement of spectral lines; 13. The behavior of spectral lines; 14. The measurement of stellar radii and temperatures; 15. The measurement of surface gravity; 16. The measurement of chemical composition; 17. Velocity fields in stellar photospheres; 18. Stellar rotation; Appendix A. Useful constants; Appendix B: Approximate physical parameters of stars; Appendix C. Atomic data; Appendix D. The strongest lines in the solar spectrum; Appendix E. Computation of random errors; Index.