Albert Einstein (/ˈaɪnstaɪn/ EYEN-styne;[4] German: [ˈalbɛɐt ˈʔaɪnʃtaɪn] ⓘ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April

1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist who is widely held to be one of the greatest and
most influential scientists of all time. Best known for developing the theory of relativity, Einstein
also made important contributions to quantum mechanics, and was thus a central figure in the
revolutionary reshaping of the scientific understanding of nature that modern
physics accomplished in the first decades of the twentieth century.[1][5] His mass–energy
equivalence formula E = mc2, which arises from relativity theory, has been called "the world's
most famous equation".[6] He received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics "for his services to
theoretical physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect",[7] a
pivotal step in the development of quantum theory. His work is also known for its influence on
the philosophy of science.[8][9]
Born in the German Empire, Einstein moved to Switzerland in 1895, forsaking his German
citizenship (as a subject of the Kingdom of Württemberg)[note 1] the following year. In 1897, at the
age of seventeen, he enrolled in the mathematics and physics teaching diploma program at the
Swiss federal polytechnic school in Zürich, graduating in 1900. In 1901, he acquired Swiss
citizenship, which he kept for the rest of his life. In 1903, he secured a permanent position at
the Swiss Patent Office in Bern. In 1905, he submitted a successful PhD dissertation to
the University of Zurich. In 1914, he moved to Berlin in order to join the Prussian Academy of
Sciences and the Humboldt University of Berlin. In 1917, he became director of the Kaiser
Wilhelm Institute for Physics; he also became a German citizen again, this time as a subject of
the Kingdom of Prussia.[note 1]
In 1933, while he was visiting the United States, Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany. Horrified
by the Nazi "war of extermination" against his fellow Jews,[10] Einstein decided to remain in the
US, and was granted American citizenship in 1940.[11] On the eve of World War II, he endorsed a
letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt alerting him to the potential German nuclear weapons
program and recommending that the US begin similar research. Einstein supported the Allies but
generally viewed the idea of nuclear weapons with great dismay.[12]
In 1905, sometimes described as his annus mirabilis (miracle year), Einstein published four
groundbreaking papers.[13] These outlined a theory of the photoelectric effect, explained Brownian
motion, introduced his special theory of relativity—a theory which addressed the inability
of classical mechanics to account satisfactorily for the behavior of the electromagnetic field—and
demonstrated that if the special theory is correct, mass and energy are equivalent to each other.
In 1915, he proposed a general theory of relativity that extended his system of mechanics to
incorporate gravitation. A cosmological paper that he published the following year laid out the
implications of general relativity for the modeling of the structure and evolution of the universe as
a whole.[14][15] The middle part of his career also saw him making important contributions
to statistical mechanics and quantum theory. Especially notable was his work on the quantum
physics of radiation, in which light consists of particles, subsequently called photons. With the
Indian physicist Satyendra Nath Bose, he laid the groundwork for Bose-Einstein statistics. For
much of the last phase of his academic life, Einstein worked on two endeavors that proved
ultimately unsuccessful. First, he advocated against quantum theory's introduction of fundamental
randomness into science's picture of the world, objecting that "God does not play dice".
[16]
Second, he attempted to devise a unified field theory by generalizing his geometric theory of
gravitation to include electromagnetism too. As a result, he became increasingly isolated from the
mainstream of modern physics.
In a 1999 poll of 130 leading physicists worldwide by the British journal Physics World, Einstein
was ranked the greatest physicist of all time.[17] His intellectual achievements and originality have
made the word Einstein broadly synonymous with genius.[18]

Life and career

Childhood, youth and education
See also: Einstein family
 Einstein in 1882, age 3
Albert Einstein was born in Ulm,[19] in the Kingdom of Württemberg in the German Empire, on 14
March 1879.[20][21] His parents, secular Ashkenazi Jews, were Hermann Einstein, a salesman and
engineer, and Pauline Koch. In 1880, the family moved to Munich's borough of Ludwigsvorstadt-
Isarvorstadt, where Einstein's father and his uncle Jakob founded Elektrotechnische Fabrik J.
Einstein & Cie, a company that manufactured electrical equipment based on direct current.[19]
Albert attended St.Peter‘s Catholic elementary school in Munich from the age of five. When he
was eight, he was transferred to the Luitpold Gymnasium, where he received advanced primary
and then secondary school education.[22]
In 1894, Hermann and Jakob's company tendered for a contract to install electric lighting in
Munich, but without success—they lacked the capital that would have been required to update
their technology from direct current to the more efficient, alternating current alternative.[23] The
failure of their bid forced them to sell their Munich factory and search for new opportunities
elsewhere. The Einstein family moved to Italy, first to Milan and a few months later to Pavia,
where they settled in Palazzo Cornazzani.[24] Einstein, then fifteen, stayed behind in Munich in
order to finish his schooling. His father wanted him to study electrical engineering, but he was a
fractious pupil who found the Gymnasium's regimen and teaching methods far from congenial. He
later wrote that the school's policy of strict rote learning was harmful to creativity. At the end of
December 1894, a letter from a doctor persuaded the Luitpold's authorities to release him from its
care, and he joined his family in Pavia.[25] While in Italy as a teenager, he wrote an essay entitled
"On the Investigation of the State of the Ether in a Magnetic Field".[26][27]
Einstein excelled at physics and mathematics from an early age, and soon acquired the
mathematical expertise normally only found in a child several years his senior. He began teaching
himself algebra, calculus and Euclidean geometry when he was twelve; he made such rapid
progress that he discovered an original proof of the Pythagorean theorem before his thirteenth
birthday.[28][29][30] A family tutor, Max Talmud, said that only a short time after he had given the
twelve year old Einstein a geometry textbook, the boy "had worked through the whole book. He
thereupon devoted himself to higher mathematics ... Soon the flight of his mathematical genius
was so high I could not follow."[31] Einstein recorded that he had "mastered integral and differential
calculus" while still just fourteen.[29] His love of algebra and geometry was so great that at twelve,
he was already confident that nature could be understood as a "mathematical structure".[31]
 Einstein in 1893, age 14

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At thirteen, when his range of enthusiasms had broadened to include music and philosophy,
[32]
Talmud introduced Einstein to Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Kant became his favorite
philosopher; according to Talmud, "At the time he was still a child, only thirteen years old, yet
Kant's works, incomprehensible to ordinary mortals, seemed to be clear to him."[31]
 Einstein's Matura certificate, 1896 [note 2]

In 1895, at the age of sixteen, Einstein sat the entrance examination for the federal polytechnic
school (later the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, ETH) in Zürich, Switzerland. He failed
to reach the required standard in the general part of the test,[33] but performed with distinction in
physics and mathematics.[34] On the advice of the polytechnic's principal, he completed his
secondary education at the Argovian cantonal school (a gymnasium) in Aarau, Switzerland,
graduating in 1896.[35] While lodging in Aarau with the family of Jost Winteler, he fell in love with
Winteler's daughter, Marie. (His sister, Maja, later married Winteler's son Paul.[36])
In January 1896, with his father's approval, Einstein renounced his citizenship of the German
Kingdom of Württemberg in order to avoid conscription into military service.
[37]
The Matura (graduation for the successful completion of higher secondary schooling) awarded
to him in the September of that year acknowledged him to have performed well across most of
the curriculum, allotting him a top grade of 6 for history, physics, algebra, geometry, and
descriptive geometry.[38] At seventeen, he enrolled in the four-year mathematics and physics
teaching diploma program at the federal polytechnic school. Marie Winteler, a year older than
him, took up a teaching post in Olsberg, Switzerland.[36]
The five other polytechnic school freshmen following the same course as Einstein included just
one woman, a twenty year old Serbian, Mileva Marić. Over the next few years, the pair spent
many hours discussing their shared interests and learning about topics in physics that the
polytechnic school's lectures did not cover. In his letters to Marić, Einstein confessed that
exploring science with her by his side was much more enjoyable than reading a textbook in
solitude. Eventually the two students became not only friends but also lovers.[39]
Historians of physics are divided on the question of the extent to which Marić contributed to the
insights of Einstein's annus mirabilis publications. There is at least some evidence that he was
influenced by her scientific ideas,[39][40][41] but there are scholars who doubt whether her impact on
his thought was of any great significance at all.[42][43][44][45]