By Matin Durrani

What better way to celebrate World Book Day than by checking out Physics World‘s new series of free-to-read, short-form ebooks. Entitled Physics World Discovery, they are short introductions to some of the hottest topics in physics written by leading voices in the physics community.

Available online here, these short-form ebooks follow all the attributes of feature articles in Physics World magazine – being well written, accessible, timely and authoritative. But as ebooks, they allow authors to go into more detail than a standard Physics World feature and include plenty of graphs, diagrams and pictures too.

Being short, each title is an ideal starting point for for physicists at all stages of their careers to get quickly up to speed with an evolving physics field.

We’ve published five Physics World Discovery texts so far, with more in the pipeline. You can read them in PDF, ePUB or Kindle format, making them perfect for those wanting intellectual stimulation on a train or plane journey.

The five Physics World Discovery titles so far published are:

• Space Weather by Mike Hapgood

• The Dark Universe by Catherine Heymans

• Quantitative Finance by Jessica James

• Proton Beam Therapy by Harald Paganetti

• Complex Light by Jeff Secor, Robert Alfano and Solyman Ashrafi

I think the new series is an exciting way of communicating top fields of physics with clarity and flair. But don’t just take my word for it. “The Physics World Discovery series is exciting and accessible and I recommend [it] whole-heartedly,” says Catherine Heymans from the Institute for Astronomy at the University of Edinburgh, who has written The Dark Universe. We’ve got further titles planned so do keep an eye out for those.

Let us know what you think of Physics World Discovery either by commenting or e-mailing us at pwld@iop.org.