Spotlights on relativity

Black holes, cosmology, gravitational waves - there are many fascinating topics in relativisty. Each of our "Spotlights on relativity" presents information on one particular aspect of relativistic physics. With very few exceptions, all of the spotlight texts are completely independent of each other, so you can browse to your heart's content - it would help, however, if you already had some previous ideas about relativity, on the level of our introduction Elementary Einstein.

The spotlight texts on Einstein Online fall into the categories listed below - however, if you'd like the big picture, we also have a Complete list of spotlight texts.

Special relativity
The basics and some applications of special relativity: Relativistic nobel prizes, the concept of relativity, E-equals-m-c-squared, time dilation and the (in)famous twins.

General relativity
Foundations of Einstein's theory of gravity: Einstein and soap bubbles, what is a source of gravity, the equivalence principle and free fall

Gravitational waves
More about gravitational waves, how they are produced and how they will hopefully be detected: a survey of current detectors, how to make gravitational waves audible, the space-borne detector LISA, Einstein@Home

Black holes & Co.
Black holes, neutron stars and supernovae: Flight into a black hole, the black hole in the center of the Milky Way, how many different kinds of black hole are there, how black holes light up their neighbourhood

Cosmology
The big bang and all the rest: The geometry of the universe, the formation of the first light chemical elements, cosmology and quantum gravity

Relativity and the quantum
Relativistic quantum theory, string theory, loop quantum gravity and other attempts to unify Einstein's gravitation with quantum theory; the uses of extra dimensions; quantum gravity and the big bang