Albert Einstein (1879-1955), Swiss-German physicist. Einstein's famous mass-energy equation resulted from his 1905 paper on Special Relativity. This paper, with his 1915 General Theory of Relativity, replaced the previously unshakeable Newtonian world view, rewriting the concepts of gravity, space and time. Early work on the photoelectric effect led to him being awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics. Emigrating to the USA in 1933, he worked at Princeton University. He encouraged the atomic bomb project, but later campaigned for nuclear disarmament.