Barbara Ryden received her Ph.D. in astrophysical sciences from Princeton University. After postdocs at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, she joined the astronomy faculty at The Ohio State University, where she is now a full professor. She has more than twenty-five years of experience in teaching, at levels ranging from introductory undergraduate courses to advanced graduate seminars. She won the Chambliss Astronomical Writing Award for her textbook Introduction to Cosmology (Cambridge, 2016). She is co-author, with Bradley M. Peterson, of one of the market leading astrophysics texts, Foundations of Astrophysics (Cambridge, 2020). Richard W. Pogge received his Ph.D. in Astronomy & Astrophysics from the University of California Santa Cruz. Following postdocs at the University of Texas at Austin and The Ohio State University, he joined the astronomy faculty at OSU where he is a full professor and vice-chair for instrumentation. His research includes observational spectrophotometry of astrophysics of gaseous nebulae from interstellar gas to active galactic nuclei using ground- and space-based observatories from radio to X-ray. He has over forty years of experience teaching both undergraduate and graduate courses.
'Ryden and Pogge have written a text with the goal of covering what every professional astronomer should know about the interstellar and intergalactic medium. They have succeeded brilliantly. This text provides comprehensive coverage of the topics without diving too far into specialist details. The authors' gift for clear writing, combined with a degree of humor and entertainment, result in an eminently readable textbook.' Evan Skillman, University of Minnesota 'Ryden and Pogge have done a remarkable job of covering the esoteric field of diffuse matter between stars and between galaxies in an encompassing and authoritative way, while maintaining an easy and approachable style. I enthusiastically recommend this worthwhile book for teachers and students of the ISM/IGM.' Karen Kwitter, Williams College, Massachusetts