Thomas Levenson is a Professor of Science Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Levenson has written five books on science and the history of science: 1989’s Ice Time: Climate Science and Life on Earth, 1994’s Measure for Measure: A Musical History of Science, 2003’s Einstein in Berlin, 2009’s Newton and the Counterfeiter, and 2016’s The Hunt for Vulcan: . . . And How Albert Einstein Destroyed a Planet, Discovered Relativity, and Deciphered the Universe. His work has been translated into six languages besides English.

Levenson has also produced, directed, written, and executive produced several science documentaries, most recently the “Back to the Beginning” episode of the PBS mini-series Origins, for which he received the 2005 National Academies Communication Award. Prior to Origins, Levenson produced the “Dome” episode in the PBS series Building Big, hosted by David Macaulay, and was honored with a 2001 George Foster Peabody Award. He blogs at The Inverse Square Blog and Balloon Juice, and his short-form writing has appeared in a wide range of newspapers, magazines, and digital publications. Levenson earned his bachelor’s degree in East Asian Studies from Harvard and now lives about three miles from the scenes of his undergraduate indiscretions with his wife, Katha Seidman, and the apple of his eye, Henry.