Errata & Updates

In a book containing such a large volume of data and complexity it is almost inevitable that mistakes will creep in. We aim to keep a record of corrections below. If you spot mistakes, do let us know.

English edition (COSMOS: The infographic book of space)

One / Space Exploration

• One small step for... / pages 10-11
  
  • The frogs are amphibians and should therefore be red.
• Human spaceflight / pages 12-13
  
  • In the print edition, Sally Ride's trips of 1983 & 1984 were accidentally omitted along with several trips by other astronauts. These missing trips are all included in the website versions of the human spaceflight graphics. Thanks to ToSeek for spotting this error.
• Travels in time and space / pages 14-15
  
  • In mid 2015, after the book had gone to press, Gennadi Padalka overtook Sergei Krikalyov as the person with the longest time in space. See our interactive web version for an automatically updated version.
  • In the book we omitted three astronauts with extremely short duration missions: Joe Walker who flew X15 Flight 90/91 in 1963, Mike Melvill who flew SpaceShipOne 15P/16P in 2004, and Brian Binnie who flew SpaceShipOne 17P in 2004.
• Launch sites / pages 18-19
  
  • In the caption for "Centre Spatial Guyanais", the word "contries" should be "countries".
• Distant voyagers / pages 34-35
  
  • There is a typo in the text about Rosetta. Where it says Rosetta visited "Mars, Jupiter and two asteroids" it should say "Mars, Earth and two asteroids".
• Planetary rovers / pages 36-37
  
  • NASA's Opportunity rover mission ended in February 2019. It's final roving distance was 45.16 km.

Two / Solar System

• Moons / pages 46-47
  
  • On October 7th 2019 20 newly discovered moons of Saturn were announced each around 5 kilometres in size. With other discoveries since the book was published in 2015, this brings Jupiter up to 79 moons (from 67) and Saturn up to 82 (from 62).
• Planetary atmospheres / pages 54-55
  
  • The 1 bar labels for Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune should all line up at 0km altitude.
• Lords of the rings / pages 56-57
  
  • The Maxwell Gap label should be Columbo Gap.
  • The Bond Gap label should be Maxwell Gap.
  • The Dawes Gap label should be Bond Gap.
  • The Cassini Division stretches from the edge of the B Ring to the edge of the A Ring.
  • The Keeler Gap label should say Encke Gap.
  • The Roche Division is the gap between the A Ring and the F Ring.
  • The Keeler Gap label should be the Encke Gap.
  • The Roche Division label is the Keeler Gap.
  • The Roche Division actually sits between the A Ring and the F Ring.
• Comet hunters / pages 72-73
  
  • Rodcomet reports that we incorrectly attributed a comet discovery to A F A L Jones when it was, in fact, co-discovered by Mervyn Jones in Australia. A F A L Jones discovered two comets.
• The high jump / pages 76-77
  
  • There is a typo for the height you could jump to on Charon. It should be 17.2 m not 1.72 m.

Three / Telescopes

• The sky's the limit / pages 88-89
  
  • Mont Blanc is listed with an elevation of 4,697m which is its prominence. However, its altitude above sea level - and what should have been used on this graphic - is around 4,810m (4,808.73m according to this source). Thanks to @louiswh for spotting this mistake (and well done on climbing Mont Blanc Louis!).
• Resolution / pages 98-99
  
  • The resolution for the European VLBI Network (Row 63 / EVN) should be 0.00015 arcseconds rather than 0.0015 arcseconds.

Four / The Sun

Five / Stars

• We are stardust / pages 142-143
  
  • Following the detection of a merging neutron star in gravitational waves and electromagnetic waves, the web version has been updated also based on Jennifer Johnson's blog.
  • Remaned "Stars" to "Low-mass stars" and "Low-mass star deaths" (the s-process).
  • "Supernovae" includes both core collapse and white dwarf supernovae.
  • Added "Merging neutron stars" (the r-process).
  • On 28 November 2016, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) approved the name and symbols for four elements: nihonium (Nh), moscovium (Mc), tennessine (Ts), and oganesson (Og), respectively for element 113 (labelled Uut), 115 (labelled Uup), 117 (labelled Uus), and 118 (labelled Uuo).

Six / Galaxies

• The local sheet of galaxies / pages 156-157
  
  • The top-most label should read 15 Mly (not 1 Mly)

Seven / Cosmology

• Models of the Universe / pages 166-167
  
  • In Ptolemy's model of the Universe, Venus appears twice. The copy that shares the Sun's orbit should not be there.

Eight / Other Worlds

• Light spheres / pages 196-197
  
  • On 19 October 2015, a preprint by Rajpaul, Aigrain & Roberts suggested that the planet around α Centauri B may have been an artefact of the data analysis.

Nine / Miscellaneous

• Water worlds / pages 206-207
  
  • The leader lines for Enceladus point at the wrong parts; the one for water should point at the blue circle and the line for the moon should point at the purple outer.
• Density / pages 208-209
  
  • The mass of the HGV is assumed to be 7.5 tonnes
• How long is a day? / pages 212-213
  
  • The number of leap seconds added since 1972 has changed since the book went to press. One was added on 30 June 2015.

End notes

• Sources, notes and acknowledgements / pages 222-224
  
  • The quoted formula from ST:TOS should be "speed/c = warp³" - the number three lost its superscript.
  • There is a missing line that should separate the references for pages 160 and 166.

中文 edition (丈量宇宙：INFOGRAPHIC！一眼秒懂全宇宙！100幅視覺資訊圖表，穿梭140億年星際太空)

• Identified Flying Objects / pages 214-215
  
  • @liangouy spotted that two answers were wrong in the translation. A question that asks "Is it very bright?" should have the answers "Yes: Venus" (金星) and "No: Mercury/Mars" (水星/火星).