Michio Kaku is an American physicist and futurist of Japanese origin. He is best known as a popularizer of science and the creator of popular science bestsellers. It is also worth noting that he has appeared in a number of BBC and Discovery Channel documentaries devoted to time and space, parallel worlds, the origin of the universe, the future of humanity, etc.
Family, childhood and university admission
Michio Kaku was born in 1947 in the state of California (USA) in a family of Japanese immigrants. It is known that Michio's grandfather came to the States to participate in the elimination of the consequences of the terrible earthquake that happened in San Francisco in 1906.
The father of the future physicist was born directly in California. However, he received his education in the Land of the Rising Sun, and therefore did not speak English well. According to available data, he met his wife (and, accordingly, Michio Kaku's mother) during the Second World War in a specialized internment camp for Japanese "Tul Lake".
Michio studied at Kibberly High School, located in the town of Palo Alto. And already here he began to show remarkable intellectual abilities. In particular, he played chess well and was the captain of the school's team for the sport. It is also known that in his youth Michio was able to build a particle accelerator for 2.3 million electron volts. In his own words, he needed an accelerator in order to generate a powerful beam of gamma rays, and then use them to obtain antimatter.
Michio showed off his homemade designs at the National Science Fair. There he was noticed by the famous physicist, one of the fathers of the hydrogen bomb, Edward Teller. Teller helped Michio get a scholarship and go to Harvard University. Moreover, he later became Michio's scientific advisor.
Further scientific career
In 1968, Kaku earned a bachelor's degree from Harvard, after which he collaborated with the Berkeley Radiation Laboratory.
In 1972, Michio Kaku was awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (despite the name, at present this degree has no practical relation to philosophy, in the USA it can be obtained by representatives of almost any scientific field).
In 1973 he was invited to lecture at Princeton University.
In 1974, Kaku published his first major scientific work on string field theory in his biography. In a sense, this work was a continuation of the scientific search of the great Albert Einstein, who pondered a lot about the so-called "theory of everything" - a theory that could unite all fundamental interactions.
In the 1980s Michio received the status of professor of theoretical physics and became a lecturer at New York City College. It is interesting that to this day he works in this particular institution of higher education.
Michio Kaku as a popularizer of science
In 1987, in collaboration with Jennifer Thompson Kaku published the first popular science book "Beyond Einstein's Scientific Thought." Then a number of books followed, which became bestsellers due to the non-trivial content and simplicity of the style. More specifically, we are talking about such books as "Hyperspace" (1994) "Einstein's Cosmos" (2004), "Physics of the Impossible" (2008), "Physics of the Future" (2011), "The Future of Mind" (2014), "The Future humanity "(2018).
And in the 21st century, Kaku began to appear quite often in documentaries on popular science topics. For example, in 2006 he played the role of presenter and narrator in a four-part documentary from the BBC corporation "Time". Each of the four episodes here was devoted to one or another aspect of the mysterious nature of time.
And, for example, in January 2007, Kaku took part in the television project from the Discovery Channel "2057", in which they made suggestions about how the life of mankind could change over the next fifty years.
In December 2009, Michio Kaku began hosting a weekly documentary series for Science Channel titled Science Fiction: The Physics of the Impossible. This series was based on one of his bestsellers and consisted of twelve episodes of 30 minutes each. In each episode, viewers were introduced to the scientific basis of such things as time travel, interstellar ships, parallel worlds, teleportation, invisibility, superpowers, "flying saucers", etc. Among other things, this series attracted by the fact that here one could hear comments from the world's leading scientists on a particular topic.
In 2010, Michio Kaku (along with Andrei Linde, Lee Smolin, Roger Penrose, Neil Turok and other respected cosmologists and physicists) took part in the BBC documentary project "Before the Big Bang", where he shared his vision of how the universe began.
It should also be added that Michio Kaku has been conducting his weekly scientific radio program for many years. It is recorded on Saturdays, lasts three hours, and is broadcast on about a hundred commercial radio stations in the United States. But, of course, you can also listen to it online from anywhere in the world. As part of this radio program, calls are also received from listeners, which gives everyone the opportunity to communicate with Professor Kaku.
Interesting facts about the scientist
Michio Kaku has a wife named Shizue. And at the moment he still lives with her in New York.
Michio Kaku is also the father of two daughters, their names are Alison and Michelle.
One of the scientist's hobbies is figure skating. On the video hosting YouTube, you can find a video where he gracefully rides on ice on skates and makes rotations.
In the late sixties Michio Kaku was drafted into the army. It is known that he graduated first from the basic training course for the military at Fort Benning, Georgia, and then the advanced course for the infantry. Michio could well have been sent to Vietnam (there was just then a military conflict in the midst of it), but in the end this did not happen.
