Albert Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany, on March 14, 1879. His parents were of Jewish descent. Einstein was a shy child, but very curious. He attended a Munich elementary school where he showed an interest in science and mathematics. He graduated high school and technical college in Switzerland. He became a Swiss citizen at the age of 22. In 1903 he married Meleva Marec. Together they had two sons, but latter they divorced. Later on, he married his cousin in 1919. In 1902 Einstein became an examiner in the Swiss patent office at Bern. In 1905, at the age of 26, he published five major research papers in an important German physics journal. He received a doctorate for the first paper, publication of the next four. These four papers would forever change mankind's view of the universe. The first paper provided a theory explaining Brownian movement, the zigzag motion of microscopic particles in suspension. Einstein suggested that the random motion of molecules of the suspension medium caused the movement as they bounced against the suspended particles. The second paper laid the foundation for the photon, or quantum, theory of light. In this he proposed that light is composed of separate packets of energy, called quanta or photons. These have some of the properties of particles and some of the properties of waves. The paper redefined the theory of light. It also explained the photoelectric effect, the emission of electron form some solids when they are struck by light. Television and other inventions are practical applications of Einstein's discoveries. The third paper introduces the "Special Theory of Relativity." Einstein showed that time and motion is relative to the observer; if the speed of light is constant and natural laws are the same everywhere in the universe. The last paper was a mathematical addition to the special theory of relativity. This is where the famous formula E = mc� came from. This formula is known as the energy mass equivalence. In 1916, Einstein published his general theory of relativity. In it he proposed that gravity is not a force, but a curved field in the space-time continuum that is created by the presence of mass. Between 1906 and 1912 Einstein taught theoretical physics in Switzerland and Germany. He returned to Zurich to teach from 1912 to 1914. Einstein became really famous when in 1919 the Royal Society of London announced that predictions made in his general theory had been confirmed. This happened when a scientific expedition in the Gulf of Guinea photographed the solar eclipse of May 29 of that year. He was awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize for physics. Contrary to what people think, it was not for his relativity theories. This is because they were still considered to be controversial. Einstein was against nationalism. He opposed war and violence and supported Zionism, the movement to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine. When the Nazis came to power in 1933, they denounced his ideas, seized his property, and burned his books. That year he moved to the United States. He became a US Citizen in 1940. Beginning in the 1920, Einstein tried to establish a mathematical relationship between electromagnetism and gravitation. He spent the rest of his life on this unsuccessful attempt to explain all of the properties of matter and energy in a single mathematical formula. In 1939, shortly before the outbreak of World War II in Europe, Einstein learned that two German chemists had split the uranium atom. Enrico Fermi, an Italian physicist who lived in the United States, suggested that splitting a Uranium Atom would result in a chain reaction that would release an enormous amount of energy. In 1939, Einstein wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt warning him that this scientific knowledge could lead to Germany's development of an atomic bomb. He suggested that the United States prepare for its own atomic bomb research. Out of this effort came the Manhattan Project. This project developed the first two atomic bombs in 1945. Einstein was in no question one of the most brilliant physicists not only in the 19th century but also throughout history. His theories and insights gave light to future thinkers and more pathways for imagination. Einstein died on April 18, 1955. He was 76 years old.
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