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News Release

Office of News and Information
Johns Hopkins University
901 South Bond Street, Suite 540
Baltimore, Maryland 21231
Phone: 443-287-9960 | Fax: 443-287-9920

October 26, 2005
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Lisa De Nike
(443) 287-9906
lde@jhu.edu

Symposium Celebrates Einstein's
Miraculous Year

A symposium marking the 100th anniversary of Albert Einstein's "Miraculous Year" will be held on Thursday, Nov. 10, at 3:30 p.m. in the Bloomberg Center for Physics and Astronomy's on the Homewood campus at The Johns Hopkins University, 3400 N. Charles St. in Baltimore.

The event, in the Bloomberg Center's Schafler Auditorium, is sponsored by the Henry A. Rowland Department of Physics and Astronomy and the Department of History of Science and Technology. It is free and open to the public and reservations are not required. Light refreshments will be served before the symposium.

In 1905, Einstein published four groundbreaking papers describing ideas that had a profound impact on all of modern physics. One of those was the theory of general relativity, in which the physicist postulated that matter and energy are equivalent. Another was Einstein's Nobel Prize-winning explanation of the photoelectric effect, in which he introduced the concept that light is composed of particles.

The symposium will commemorate these accomplishments by bringing together scientists and historians of science to discuss Einstein's important legacy.

Adam Falk, interim dean of the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences at Johns Hopkins and a physicist, will introduce the speakers, who include Richard Staley, professor of the history of science at the University of Wisconsin, Madison; Robert Marc Friedman, professor of the history of science at the University of Olso, Norway; and Robert Kirshner, professor of astronomy at Harvard University.

Aimed at a general audience, the lectures will touch upon various aspects of Einstein's historic contributions and their effect on science today. Speaking about "Einstein and the Overthrow of Classical Physics," Staley will address Einstein's transformative influence. Friedman's talk, "Einstein Must Never Receive a Nobel Prize: The Nobel Committee vs. Albert Einstein and its Importance for 2005," will touch upon the controversies — particularly those related to the theory of general relativity — that Einstein's ideas generated. Finally, Kushner's talk, "Einstein's Blunder Undone: The Discovery of the Accelerating Universe," will describe recent experimental observations that demonstrate how certain of Einstein's predictions are still having an impact on our current understanding of the universe.

The symposium will conclude with questions from the audience.

For details, call 410-516-8649 or visit www.pha.jhu.edu/events/seminars/ or www.pha.jhu.edu/Einstein.


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