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Articles on Albert Einstein

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A portrait of Albert Einstein on a transformer station in St.Petersburg, Russia. (Shutterstock)

Why the h-index is a bogus measure of academic impact

The h-index has become an indicator of quality for many researchers and may influence the allocation of research funds. But some question its value.
Woodcut from Camille Flammarion’s 1888 book L'Atmosphère : météorologie populaire. The caption reads: ‘A missionary of the Middle Ages tells that he had found the point where the sky and the Earth touch’ and continues, ‘What is there, then, in this blue sky, which certainly exists, and which veils the stars during the day?’ Wikipedia

Einstein’s two mistakes

Albert Einstein may have been the ultimate example of a visionary genius, but that did not stop him from twice losing his way due to beliefs that were perhaps not so scientific.
A white dward (centre) and its companion pulsar make for an excellent natural gravitational laboratory. Mark Myers/OzGrav

Warp factor: we’ve observed a spinning star that drags the very fabric of space and time

One of Einstein’s weirder predictions is that massive, spinning objects exert a drag on space-time itself. Now an orbiting pair of unusual stars has revealed this effect in action.
There seems be an attractive quality to things that are ostensibly unhealthy or dangerous. Alisusha/Shutterstock.com

What’s behind our appetite for self-destruction?

Edgar Allen Poe, Sigmund Freud and cognitive scientists have all wrestled with the human tendency to behave in ways that are irrational and self-defeating.
An artist’s impression of the path of star S2 as it passes very close to the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way. The very strong gravitational field causes the colour of the star to shift slightly to the red. (Size and colour exaggerated for clarity.) ESO/M. Kornmesser

Einstein’s theory of gravity tested by a star speeding past a supermassive black hole

Astronomers traced a single star as it passed close to the black hole at the centre of our galaxy, and detected the telltale signature of Einstein’s gravity in action.
New research concludes that there are many “Lost Einsteins” in America – children who had the ability to become inventors but didn’t because of where they were born. Shutterstock.com

How talented kids from low-income families become America’s ‘Lost Einsteins’

A new analysis shows how family background influences who grows up to invent. The key to turning things around? Expose kids to more inventors.
The manuscript of ‘Memoirs of Sir Isaac Newton’ shows the words ‘does this apple fall?’ Newton’s curiosity about the falling piece of fruit helped him develop the theory of gravity. (AP Photo/Lucy Young)

No new Einsteins to emerge if science funding snubs curiosity

Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein would have bridled under today’s research funding bureaucracy. It’s time to allow scientists to indulge their curiosity again.

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