Student Recreates Einstein Experiment 107 Years Later

When the moon blocks the sun over Iceland on Wednesday, a graduate student will prove Einstein right all over again using the same experiment that made headlines 107 years ago.

University of Iceland PhD student Matthias Harksen is recreating the legendary Eddington experiment during the August 12 total solar eclipse. The original 1919 study offered the first proof that Albert Einstein's wild idea about gravity was actually correct.

Einstein had suggested something that sounded impossible at the time. Gravity wasn't a pulling force like Newton thought. Instead, massive objects like the sun actually bend the fabric of space and time itself.

British astronomer Arthur Eddington knew how to test this. If Einstein was right, the sun's gravity should bend starlight passing nearby. But you could never see this effect during a normal day because the sun's glare drowns out the stars.

A total solar eclipse offered the perfect window. In May 1919, Eddington set up telescopic cameras in two locations: Príncipe island off Africa and the Brazilian city of Sobral. When the moon blocked the sun's light, he photographed the stars and compared their positions to existing star maps.

The stars appeared exactly where Einstein predicted they would. The sun had bent their light by 1.75 seconds of arc, twice what Newton's laws would have calculated.

Scientific American covered the breakthrough that November, calling it "one of the rare instances in which a topic of pure science assumes sufficient journalistic importance to justify cable despatches a column long." The discovery ran alongside other news of the day, including a mechanical hand that held phone receivers and Britain's decision to abandon airship development.

Now Harksen wants to show that anyone can recreate this landmark moment in physics. The experiment doesn't require fancy equipment, just a telescope with a proper solar filter attached. Looking through an unfiltered telescope causes permanent eye damage, even with eclipse glasses.

Why This Inspires

Science's greatest moments don't have to stay locked in history books or require million-dollar labs. Harksen's recreation proves that ordinary people with basic equipment can verify the same cosmic truths that revolutionized our understanding of the universe. The experiment democratizes one of humanity's biggest intellectual leaps, showing that curiosity and a clear sky are sometimes all you need to touch the infinite.

His work arrives at a perfect moment, when the path of totality crosses Iceland, Spain, Portugal, and the Arctic Circle.

The experiment that made Einstein a household name is now simple enough for backyard astronomers to try.