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As 1905 dawned,

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the soon-to-be 26-year-old Albert Einstein[br]faced life as a failed academic.

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Most physicists of the time[br]would have scoffed at the idea

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that this minor civil servant[br]could have much to contribute to science.

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Yet within the following year,

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Einstein would publish not one,

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not two,

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not three,

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but four extraordinary papers,[br]each on a different topic,

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that were destined to radically transform[br]our understanding of the universe.

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The myth that Einstein[br]had failed math is just that.

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He had mastered calculus on his own[br]by the age of 15

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and done well at both[br]his Munich secondary school

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and at the Swiss Polytechnic,

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where he studied for[br]a math and physics teaching diploma.

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But skipping classes to spend[br]more time in the lab

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and neglecting to show proper deference[br]to his professors

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had derailed his intended career path.

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Passed over even[br]for a lab assistant position,

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he had to settle for a job[br]at the Swiss patent office,

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obtained with the help[br]of a friend's father.

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Working six days a week as a patent clerk,

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Einstein still managed to make[br]some time for physics,

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discussing the latest work[br]with a few close friends,

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and publishing a couple of minor papers.

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It came as a major surprise

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when in March 1905 he submitted[br]a paper with a shocking hypothesis.

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Despite decades of evidence[br]that light was a wave,

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Einstein proposed that it could,[br]in fact, be a particle,

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showing that mysterious phenomena,[br]such as the photoelectric effect,

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could be explained by his hypothesis.

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The idea was derided for years to come,

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but Einstein was simply[br]twenty years ahead of his time.

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Wave-particle duality was slated to become[br]a cornerstone of the quantum revolution.

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Two months later in May,[br]Einstein submitted a second paper,

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this time tackling the centuries old[br]question of whether atoms actually exist.

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Though certain theories were built on[br]the idea of invisible atoms,

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some prominent scientists still[br]believed them to be a useful fiction,

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rather than actual physical objects.

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But Einstein used an ingenious argument,

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showing that the behavior[br]of small particles

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randomly moving around in a liquid,[br]known as Brownian motion,

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could be precisely predicted

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by the collisions of millions[br]of invisible atoms.

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Experiments soon confirmed[br]Einstein's model,

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and atomic skeptics threw in the towel.

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The third paper came in June.

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For a long time,

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Einstein had been troubled[br]by an inconsistency

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between two fundamental[br]principles of physics.

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The well established[br]principle of relativity,

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going all the way back to Galileo,

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stated that absolute motion[br]could not be defined.

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Yet electromagnetic theory,[br]also well established,

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asserted that absolute motion did exist.

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The discrepancy,[br]and his inability to resolve it,

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left Einstein in what he described[br]as a state of psychic tension.

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But one day in May,

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after he had mulled over the puzzle[br]with his friend Michele Besso,

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the clouds parted.

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Einstein realized[br]that the contradiction could be resolved

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if it was the speed of light[br]that remained constant,

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regardless of reference frame,

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while both time and space[br]were relative to the observer.

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It took Einstein only a few weeks[br]to work out the details

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and formulate what came to be known[br]as special relativity.

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The theory not only shattered[br]our previous understanding of reality

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but would also pave the way[br]for technologies,

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ranging from particle accelerators,

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to the global positioning system.

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One might think that this was enough,

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but in September,

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a fourth paper arrived as a "by the way"[br]follow-up to the special relativity paper.

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Einstein had thought a little bit more[br]about his theory,

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and realized it also implied[br]that mass and energy,

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one apparently solid[br]and the other supposedly ethereal,

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were actually equivalent.

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And their relationship could be expressed[br]in what was to become the most famous

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and consequential equation in history:

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E=mc^2.

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Einstein would not become a world famous[br]icon for nearly another fifteen years.

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It was only after his later general theory[br]of relativity was confirmed in 1919

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by measuring the bending of starlight[br]during a solar eclipse

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that the press would turn him[br]into a celebrity.

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But even if he had disappeared back[br]into the patent office

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and accomplished nothing else after 1905,

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those four papers of his miracle year

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would have remained the gold standard[br]of startling unexpected genius.