Michio Kaku

Everyone from Carl Sagan to Stephen Hawking has made the leap from the laboratory to the bookshelf by bringing high-concept physics to the masses. Cosmologist and string theorist Michio Kaku follows in those footsteps. Besides appearing on numerous cable and network-news programs, Kaku has written a series of popular books that help explain the inner workings of the universe in down-to-earth, even fun terms—an accessibility very much at play in his 2008 book, Physics Of The Impossible, in which he probes the probability of science-fiction clichés such as force fields, teleportation, and travel between the stars. And, like the best pop-physics authors, Kaku isn't afraid to throw in personal anecdotes or wry comments on society to help humanize his heady ideas.