Nuclear astrophysics as it stands today is a fascinating science. Even though, compared to other scientific fields, it is a young discipline which has developed only in this century, it has answered many questions concerning the under standing of our cosmos. One of these great achievements was the concept of nucleosynthesis, the creation of the elements in the early universe in interstellar matter and in stars. Nuclear astrophysics has continued, to solve many riddles of the evolution of the myriads of stars in our cosmos. This review volume attempts to provide an overview of the current status of nuclear astrophysics. Special emphasis is given to the interdisciplinary nature of the field: astronomy, nuclear physics, astrophysics and particle physics are equally involved. One basic effort of nuclear astrophysics is the collection of ob servational facts with astronomical methods. Laboratory studies of the nuclear processes involved in various astrophysical scenarios have provided fundamen tal information serving both as input for and test of astrophysical models. The theoretical understanding of nuclear reaction mechanisms is necessary, for example, to extrapolate the experimentally determined reaction rates to the thermonuclear energy range, which is relevant for the nuclear processes in our cosmos. Astrophysical models and calculations allow us to simulate how nuclear processes contribute to driving the evolution of stars, interstellar matter and the whole universe. Finally, elementary particle physics also plays an important role in the field of nuclear astrophysics, for instance through weak interaction processes involving neutrinos."

Computation is essential to our modern understanding of nuclear systems. Although simple analytical models might guide our intuition, the complex ity of the nuclear many-body problem and the ever-increasing precision of experimental results require large-scale numerical studies for a quantitative understanding. Despite their importance, many nuclear physics computations remain something of a black art. A practicing nuclear physicist might be familiar with one or another type of computation, but there is no way to systemati cally acquire broad experience. Although computational methods and results are often presented in the literature, it is often difficult to obtain the working codes. More often than not, particular numerical expertise resides in one or a few individuals, who must be contacted informally to generate results; this option becomes unavailable when these individuals leave the field. And while the teaching of modern nuclear physics can benefit enormously from realistic computer simulations, there has been no source for much of the important material. The present volume, the second of two, is an experiment aimed at address ing some of these problems. We have asked recognized experts in various aspects of computational nuclear physics to codify their expertise in indi vidual chapters. Each chapter takes the form of a brief description of the relevant physics (with appropriate references to the literature), followed by a discussion of the numerical methods used and their embodiment in a FOR TRAN code. The chapters also contain sample input and test runs, as well as suggestions for further exploration."