Michelson Mile Marker Commemorates Speed of Light Measurement in Irvine

Did you know? The City of Irvine and partners recently installed and dedicated a plaque marking the local site of the measurement of the speed of light by Albert Michelson and his team in present-day Irvine. In 1931, Albert Einstein visited physicist Albert Michelson on the Irvine Ranch to observe ongoing experiments using a 1-mile-long vacuum tube to measure the speed of light. Michelson’s measurements of light made him the first American scientist to win a Nobel Prize and paved the way for Einstein’s relativity theories and famous E=mc^2 equation. Watch video of the dedication here. Images courtesy of the City of Irvine.