Albert Einstein shoots to fame after publishing his theory of relativity
Born into a middle-class Jewish family in 1879, Albert Einstein moved from his birthplace in Ulm to Munich whilst very young. After the family moved again, this time to Switzerland, Albert’s father arranged for him to be released from German citizenship, probably to exempt him from military service. After studying in Zurich, Einstein was stateless for five years before obtaining Swiss citizenship and a position at the patent office in Bern. There he continued his previous research into physics. His scientific breakthrough came in 1905 – and it announced the arrival of genius. In one paper published on 26 September 1905, Einstein outlined his special theory of relativity with its famous formula: energy equals mass times the speed of light squared (E=mc²). This new understanding of matter, space and time made Einstein world-famous overnight. After ten more years in Switzerland, Einstein accepted a position in Berlin and regained his German citizenship. He spent 18 years in Berlin, during which time he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1921.
After the Nazis came to power, Einstein renounced his German citizenship for a second time and moved to the United States, where he obtained US citizenship in 1940. After 1945, revelations of the Holocaust estranged Einstein from the country of his birth. Einstein died in 1955. He is still regarded as the epitome of the researcher genius and is one of the most famous scientists of all time.
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