E=mc2 : A Biography of the World's Most Famous Equation

Generations have grown up knowing that Albert Einstein's equation E=mc[superscript 2] changed the shape of our world, but never understanding what it actually means, why it was so significant, and how it informs our daily lives today-governing, as it does, everything from the atomic bomb to a television's cathode ray tube to the carbon dating of prehistoric paintings. In this book, David Bodanis writes the "biography" of one of the greatest scientific discoveries in history, made a century ago-that the realms of energy and matter are inescapably linked. Through his skill as a writer and teacher, he turns a seemingly impenetrable theory into a dramatic human achievement and an uncommonly good story. Book jacket.

David Bodanis taught for many years a survey of intellectual history at the University of Oxford