facts

Another physicist, Max Planck, took the first steps towards quantum mechanics in 1900. While working in Berlin, Planck discovered that radiation from a body that was glowing red hot could be explained if light came only in packets of a certain size, called quanta. While working at the patent office, Einstein used Planck's quanta to explain what is now called the photoelectric effect. The photoelectric effect is concerned with the way certain metals give off electrons when light falls on them, and is the basis off which modern light detectors and television cameras are developed.

However, quantum physics' ability to explain the photoelectric effect is only a small portion of its overall significance. One of the larger roles quantum physics has played is succeeding in correctly predicting the behavior of sub-atomic particles, a task that the theory of general relativity fails to do accurately.