Carl Sagan

Carl Sagan research papers look at the life of this influential astronomer and reveal how his ability to put astronomy in simple terms changed how the world looked at the cosmos. In your paper on Sagan, you will want to include a few of the following basic facts regarding the life of Carl Sagan.

• Carl Sagan (1934-1996) was an astronomer and author, well known to American television audiences for his 1980 PBS series Cosmos.
• Sagan was also the author of more than 20 books, mostly on popular science topics, but also the science-fiction novel Contact.
• Much of Sagan's scientific work involved the search for extraterrestrial life.

Carl Sagan's Biography

Carl Sagan was born in New York City, graduating high school in 1951 and attended the University of Chicago, where he earned a Ph. D. in 1960 under the guidance of Gerard Kuiper, for whom the Kuiper Belt is named. Sagan worked at Harvard until 1968, when he moved to Cornell. He also worked as an advisor to NASA, and briefed many of the Apollo astronauts before their trips to the moon.

Scientifically, Sagan's major contribution was discovering high surface temperatures on Venus. However, he was far better at communicating scientific ideas to the general public. In 1980 he co-wrote and co-produced a thirteen-parts series for PBS, Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, which explored a wide range of scientific subjects from the origin of life to the structure of the universe. Seen by over 500 million people in 60 countries, it remains the most widely watched PBS series in history. Sagan's books include The Dragons of Eden, Broca's Brain, Pale Blue Dot, and the novel Contact, which was later made into a film. Sagan died in 1996 from pneumonia, which resulted from his myelodysplasia.