Einstein's Co-author: A cautionary tale for science editors

Among the many notable achievements of Einstein's work, was the discovery of his coworker in Berlin, S.B. Preuss, though it received little publicity.

A review article about cosmology stated: "The discovery ... of Hubble's law ... led Einstein to ... reject the notorious cosmological term (Einstein and Preuss, 1931)".

The curious reader who has followed Einstein's life story and knows of his collaborations with M. Grossman, J. Grommer and W. Mayer (to name a few), but who has never heard of Preuss, eagerly turns to the references given. It is: A. Einstein and Preuss, S.B. (1931), _Akad. Wiss._, 235. Surely the _Akad. Wiss._ must be the Berlin Academy? Happily enough for those without access to the originals, Einstein's reports to the Berlin Academy were reproduced on the occasion of celebrations of Einstein's 100th birthday in 1979. A glance at the appropriate page of the 1931 volume of the _Sitzungsberichte der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften_ (Reports of the meetings of the Prussian Academy of Science) reveals the workings of a creative mind. Let us look at the following sequence of references:

Einstein, A. (1931). _Sitzungsber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss._ ...

A. Einstein, 1931, _Sitzgsber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss._ ...

A. Einstein, _Sitzber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss._ ... (1931)

A. Einstein (1931) _Sber. preuss. Akad. Wiss._ ...

Einstein, A., 1931, S.B. Preuss. _Akad. Wiss._ ...

A. Einstein, S.B. Preuss, _Akad. Wiss._, 1931 ...

A. Einstein, S.B. Preuss, _Akad. Wiss._ (1931) ...

A. Einstein and Preuss, S.B. (1931) _Akad. Wiss._ ...

Thus, it turns out that the birth and death of S.B. Preuss occurred within such a very short time span that any scientific endeavors attempted could come to nothing. One hopes that this will be noticed by the people producing the citation index. Otherwise, in a generation or two, a young historian of science might apply for a grant to uncover more details from the brief, but not entirely joyless, life of S.B. Preuss.

Source: "Droll Science," an anthology compiled by Robert L. Weber