Transcript Document

Albert Einstein
1879-1955
By Alyssa Evans, Chemistry Outreach, Spring 2001
“If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?”
Life of Albert Einstein
1879: March 14, Albert Einstein is born to Hermann and Pauline
Einstein in Ulm, Germany
1885: Albert begins taking violin lessons
1896: Albert graduated from high school and enrolls at the Federal
Polytechnic (ETH) in Zurich.
1898: Einstein falls in love with Mileva Maric, a Hungarian
classmate at the ETH
1900: Albert graduates from the ETH
1901: Einstein becomes a Swiss citizen and Mileva becomes
pregnant
1902: Mileva gives birth to a daughter Lieserl, she is put up for
adoption and all records of her disappear. Albert takes a job at the
Swiss Patent Office
Major contributions to the Sciences
1939: WWII begins. Einstein writes a letter to President
Franklin D. Roosevelt warning of the possibility of
Germany building an atomic bomb and urging nuclear
research
1940: Einstein becomes an American citizen
1952: Einstein was offered the position of president of
the state of Israel. He turned it down
1955: A week before his death, Einstein signs a letter
agreeing that his name should go on a letter urging all
nations to give up nuclear weapons – his last act for
international peace. On April 18, Albert Einstein dies of
heart failure. Beside his bed lay the pages of an
unfinished calculation on the unified field theory.
In one year, Einstein published five research papers. These publications
would change mankind’s view of the universe forever
In March, Einstein used Max Planck’s quantum theory of light to explain
the photoelectric effect. He proposed that light is composed of individual
packets of energy, known as photons. These photons have properties of
both waves and particles
Figure: The photoelectric effect. When photons of high energy strike a
metal surface, electrons are emitted from the metal (a).The emitted
electrons are drawn toward the positive terminal. The result: current will
flow through the circuit (b).
Solvay Conference of 1927
1903: Albert and Mileva marry
1904: Mileva gives birth to a son, Hans Albert, who eventually
becomes a professor of hydraulics at the University of CA, Berkeley
1905: Einstein’s “Miracle Year”. Einstein publishes five papers
which would change the view of science
Source: Brown, T.L., LeMay, H.E., Bursten,B.E, Chemistry: The Central Science, Seventh Edition.
(Prentice Hall: NJ 1997) 187.
1910: Son Eduard is born, although he excelled in music and
literature he would die in a Swiss psychiatric hospital
1911: Albert is the youngest to attend the invitation-only Solvay
Conference in Brussels, the first world physics conference
1914: Mileva and Albert divorce
1915: Einstein completes the General Theory of Relativity
1919: Albert marries his cousin, Elsa
1922: Albert is awarded the Nobel Prize of 1921 in Chemistry for
his work on the Photoelectric effect
1927: Attends the fifth Solvay Conference and begins developing
the foundation of quantum mechanics with Bohr
Einstein’s colleagues – How many names do you
recognize? Front row, left to right: I. Langmuir, M.
Planck, M. Curie, H.A. Lorentz, A. Einstein, P. Langevin,
C.E. Guye, C.T.R. Wilson, O.W. Richardson. Second row:
P.Debye, M. Knudsen, W.L. Bragg, H.A. Kramers, P.A.M.
Dirac, A.H. Compton, L.V. deBroglie, M.Born, N. Bohr.
Standing: A. Piccard, E. Henriot, P. Ehrenfest, E. Herzen,
T. De Donder, E. Schroedinger, E. Verschaffelt,W. Pauli,
W. Heisenberg, R.H. Fowler, L. Brillouin
References:
1933: Albert, identified as a Jew, leaves Germany and with his wife
Elsa come to the US. He assumes a post at Princeton, New Jersey
1936: Elsa dies after a brief illness
Brian, Denis. Einstein: A Life (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: NY, 1996)
Levenson, Thomas. “How smart was he?”
1996.www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/einstein/genius/index.html. (1/30/01)
“Time Line of Einstein’s Life”
www.humboldt1.com/~gralsto/einstein/timeline.html. (1/23/01)
April and May brings about the publication of two papers. In one, Einstein
discusses a new method of counting and determining the size of atoms or
molecules in a given space. In the other, he explains the phenomenon of
Brownian motion. The result of these papers is proof that atoms actually
exist
June, Einstein publishes what is known today as the special theory of
relativity. In it, he shows that time and motion are relative to the observer.
If the speed is constant, the natural laws are the same everywhere in the
universe
The last paper was a mathematical addition to the special theory of
relativity. Here Einstein presents the formula E=mc2. This formula proved
that a small particle of matter is the equivalent to an enormous quantity of
energy.
Ten years later Einstein published his general theory of relativity. In it, he
proposes that gravity is not a force, but a curved field that is created by the
presence of mass.