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Michio Kaku

Theoretical physicist Dr Michio Kaku tells Michael Berkeley how he built a particle accelerator as a teenager, and about his passions for Einstein, ice dancing, and trumpet music.

Michael Berkeley’s guest is the theoretical physicist Dr Michio Kaku - without doubt the only guest ever to have built a particle accelerator in their garage while still in high school. After that auspicious start Michio went onto become the co-founder of string theory in the 1970s; a professor at The City University of New York; and one of the world’s most prominent scientists.

He is also a great science communicator, so alongside his hundreds of scientific papers, he has written bestselling science books and appears regularly on television and radio all over the world. His latest book, The God Equation, describes his quest to continue Einstein’s search for a ‘theory of everything’.

Michio tells Michael how that particle accelerator drove his mother to distraction by blowing every fuse in the house and how his parents survived internment as Japanese-Americans during the Second World War. And he shares his passion for ice dancing to opera arias and his life-long love of the trumpet.

Producer: Jane Greenwood
A Loftus Media production for 91Èȱ¬ Radio 3

Available now

41 minutes

Last on

Sun 25 Jul 2021 12:00

Music Played

  • Giacomo Puccini

    Mi chiamano Mimi (La Boheme)

    Singer: Leontyne Price. Orchestra: New Philharmonia Orchestra. Conductor: Sir Edward Downes.
  • Franz Liszt

    Les Preludes

    Orchestra: 91Èȱ¬ Philharmonic. Conductor: Gianandrea Noseda.
  • Jeremiah Clarke

    Trumpet Tune (Prince of Denmark's March)

    Performer: Ole Edvard Antonsen. Performer: Wayne Marshall.
  • George Frideric Handel

    Hallelujah Chorus (Messiah)

    Choir: RIAS Chamber Choir. Ensemble: Academy for Ancient Music Berlin. Conductor: Justin Doyle.
  • Henry Purcell

    Martial Air (Trumpet Tunes)

    Ensemble: New England Brass Ensemble.
  • Modest Mussorgsky

    Promenade - Gnomus (Pictures at an Exhibition)

    Music Arranger: Maurice Ravel. Orchestra: Ukraine National Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Theodore Kuchar.

Broadcast

  • Sun 25 Jul 2021 12:00

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