AIP launches centennial exhibit on the theory of general relativity

2015 NBLA Einstein calendar cover

Albert Einstein remains the iconic figure of modern physics, and his name conjures up the complexities of science as well as its attraction for the public. On March 14—his 136th birthday—AIP History Programs launched a small web exhibit to celebrate the centennial of the publication of his theory of general relativity. The exhibit briefly traces the progression of the theory from Einstein’s initial three publications in November 1915 through tests offered by Karl Schwarzschild, David Hilbert, Arthur Eddington, and others; to the revival of interest in general relativity after World War II; and to the results expected from new gravitational detectors like LIGO and eLISA. 

The exhibit grew out of a joint project by AIP, the Einstein Papers Project at Caltech, and the Albert Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The illustrations and text were first used in AIP’s annual calendar, which was sent to donors and friends at the end of 2014. The web exhibit enables the project to reach an international audience and links to three major sites that provide additional information. 

Karl Schwarzschild (1873–1916)
Albert Einstein

 

AIP’s Niels Bohr Library and Archives contains a variety of publications by Einstein and others on general relativity, and the History Program’s popular web exhibit, “Albert Einstein, Image and Impact,” draws more than three-quarters of a million users each year to learn about his life and science. In addition, our extensive collection of online oral histories contains information on relativity from both his contemporaries and later scientists.

Einstein’s original correspondence, notebooks, and other papers are preserved at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the Einstein Papers Project, now at Caltech, is an ongoing, decades-long undertaking to translate, annotate, and publish the papers. The project reached a major milestone on December 5, 2014, when it published 5,000 of the documents online dating to 1923 and covering the first 44 years of his life. The Digital Einstein Papers, created by the Einstein Papers Project at Caltech with the support of Princeton University Press, provides scholars and the public alike with an easily accessible panorama of Einstein’s work and personal life. In its first four months the site has had 135,000 users with 1.5 million page views. 

Our work with Caltech’s Einstein Papers Project and the Albert Einstein Archives typifies AIP’s core philosophy in preserving and making known the history of the physical scientists. The physicists who created the AIP History Programs in the early 1960s specified that we would work cooperatively with other repositories and programs to support an international effort to document the history of our fields. The History Programs’ staff continues to work to accomplish this important and ambitious goal. 

John A. Wheeler (1911–2008)
Results about gravitational waves expected from gravitational detectors