SCIENCE OF INDIA by Nilesh Joshi, Leena Joshi (book series for 12 year olds txt) š
- Author: Nilesh Joshi, Leena Joshi
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DEDICATED TO MY STUDENTS OF 11 AND 12 SCIENCE
CHAPTER 1 14 Indian Scientists Who Changed The World. And Things You Probably Didnāt Know About Them!
14 Indian Scientists Who Changed The World. And Things You Probably Didnāt Know About Them!
Science is an important part of our everyday life, even more so than we notice. From our fancy gadgets to the the technologies we canāt live without, from our humble light bulb to the space explorations, it is all gift of science and technology. I wonder what would we be doing if none of these things were invented? How often do we take out the time to think about those extra ordinary minds who made life easier for us? Here is a list of 14 Indian scientists who achieved a global recognition.
1. CV Raman
Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1930 for his pioneering work on scattering of light. Born in Tiruchirapalli on November 7, 1888, he was the first Asian and first non-White to receive any Nobel Prize in the sciences. Raman also worked on the acoustics of musical instruments. He was the first to investigate the harmonic nature of the sound of the Indian drums such as the tabla and the mridangam.
He discovered that, when light traverses a transparent material, some of the deflected light changes in wavelength. This phenomenon is now called the Raman scattering and is the result of the Raman effect.
In October 1970, he collapsed in his laboratory. He was moved to a hospital and the doctors gave him four hours to live. He survived and after a few days refused to stay in the hospital as he preferred to die in the gardens of his Institute (the Raman Research Institute in Bangalore) surrounded by his flowers. He died of natural causes on 21 November 1970.
Before dying, Raman told his students,
Do not allow the journals of the Academy to die, for they are the sensitive indicators of the quality of Science being done in the country and whether science is taking root in it or not.
2. Homi J. Bhabha
Born on October 30, 1909 in Bombay, Homi Jehangir Bhabha played an important role in the Quantum Theory.
He was the first person to become the Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission of India. Having started his scientific career in nuclear physics from Great Britain, Bhabha returned to India and played a key role in convincing the Congress Partyās senior leaders, most notably Jawaharlal Nehru, to start the ambitious nuclear programme.
Bhabha is generally acknowledged as the father of Indian nuclear power. But few people know that he was absolutely against India manufacturing atomic bombs, even if the country had enough resources to do so. Instead he suggested that the production of an atomic reactor should be used to lessen Indiaās misery and poverty.
He died when Air India Flight 101 crashed near Mont Blanc on 24 January 1966. Many possible theories of the crash came up including a conspiracy theory in which the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is involved in order to paralyze Indiaās nuclear program.
3. Visvesvaraya
Born on 15 September 1860, Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya was a notable Indian engineer, scholar, statesman and the Diwan of Mysore during 1912 to 1918. He was a recipient of the Indian Republicās highest honour, the Bharat Ratna.
Sir M V suggested that India try to be at par with industrialized nations as he believed that India can become developed through industries.
He has the credit of inventing āautomatic sluice gatesā and āblock irrigation systemā which are still considered to be marvels in engineering. Each year, his birthday 15 September is celebrated as Engineerās Day in India.
Since river beds were costly, he came up with an efficient way of filtering water through āCollector Wellsā in 1895 which was rarely seen anywhere in the world.
4. Venkatraman Radhakrishnan
Venkatraman Radhakrishnan was born on May 18, 1929 in Tondaripet, a suburb of Chennai. Venkataraman was a globally renowned space scientist and a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
He was an internationally acclaimed Astrophysicist and also known for his design and fabrication of ultralight aircraft and sailboats.
His observations and theoretical insights helped the community in unraveling many mysteries surrounding pulsars, interstellar clouds, galaxy structures and various other celestial bodies. He died at the age of 81 in Bangalore.
5. S. Chandrashekar
Born on October 19, 1910 in Lahore, British India, he was awarded the 1983 Nobel Prize for Physics for his mathematical theory of black holes. The Chandrasekhar limit is named after him. He was nephew of CV Raman. Chandra became a United States citizen in 1953.
His most celebrated work concerns the radiation of energy from stars, particularly white dwarf stars, which are the dying fragments of stars. He died on August 21, 1995, at the age of 82 in Chicago.
6. Satyendra Nath Bose
Born on January 1, 1894 in Calcutta, SN Bose was an Indian physicist specialising in quantum mechanics. He is of course most remembered for his role played in the class of particles ābosonsā, which were named after him by Paul Dirac to commemorate his work in the field.
Bose adapted a lecture at the University of Dhaka on the theory of radiation and the ultraviolet catastrophe into a short article called āPlanckās Law and the Hypothesis of Light Quantaā and sent it to Albert Einstein. Einstein agreed with him, translated Boseās paper āPlanckās Law and Hypothesis of Light Quantaā into German, and had it published in Zeitschrift fĆ¼r Physik under Boseās name, in 1924. This formed the basis of the Bose-Einstein Statistics.
In 1937, Rabindranath Tagore dedicated his only book on science, VisvaāParichay, to Satyendra Nath Bose. The Government of India awarded him Indiaās second highest civilian award, the Padma Vibhushan in 1954.
7. Meghnad Saha
Born on October 6, 1893 in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Meghnad Sahaās best-known work concerned the thermal ionisation of elements, and it led him to formulate what is known as the Saha Equation. This equation is one of the basic tools for interpretation of the spectra of stars in astrophysics. By studying the spectra of various stars, one can find their temperature and from that, using Sahaās equation, determine the ionisation state of the various elements making up the star.
He also invented an instrument to measure the weight and pressure of solar rays. But did you know, he was also the chief architect of river planning in India? He prepared the original plan for the Damodar Valley Project.
8. Srinivasa Ramanujan
Born on December 22, 1887 in Tamil Nadu, Ramanujam was an Indian mathematician and autodidact who, with almost no formal training in pure mathematics, made extraordinary contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series, and continued fractions.
By age 11, he had exhausted the mathematical knowledge of two college students who were lodgers at his home. He was later lent a book on advanced trigonometry written by S. L. Loney. He completely mastered this book by the age of 13 and discovered sophisticated theorems on his own.
We hadnāt known before that he faced a lot of health problems while living in England due to scarcity of vegetarian food. He returned to India and died at a young age of 32.
Ramanujanās home state of Tamil Nadu celebrates 22 December (Ramanujanās birthday) as āState IT Dayā, memorializing both the man and his achievements.
9. Jagadish Chandra Bose
Acharya J.C. Bose was a man of many talents. Born on 30 November, 1858 in Bikrampur, West Bengal, he was a polymath, physicist, biologist, botanist and archaeologist. He pioneered the study of radio and microwave optics, made important contributions to the study of plants and laid the foundation of experimental science in the Indian sub-continent. He was the first person to use semiconductor junctions to detect radio signals, thus demonstrating wireless communication for the first time. Whatās more, he is also probably the father of open technology, as he made his inventions and work freely available for others to further develop. His reluctance for patenting his work is legendary.
Another of his well known inventions is the crescograph, through which he measured plant response to various stimuli and hypothesized that plants can feel pain, understand affection etc.
While most of us are aware of his scientific prowess, we might not be aware of his talent as an early writer of science fiction! He is in fact considered the father of Bengali science fiction.
10. Vikram Sarabhai
Considered as the Father of Indiaās space programme, Vikram Sarabhai was born on on 12 August, 1919 in the city of Ahmedabad in Gujarat. He was instrumental in the setting up of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), when he successfully convinced the Indian government of the importance of a space programme for a developing nation after the launch of the Russian Sputnik, in this quote:
There are some who question the relevance of space activities in a developing nation. To us, there is no ambiguity of purpose. We do not have the fantasy of competing with the economically advanced nations in the exploration of the moon or the planets or manned space-flight.
But we are convinced that if we are to play a meaningful role nationally, and in the community of nations, we must be second to none in the application of advanced technologies to the real problems of man and society.
He was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1966 and the Padma Vubhushan after his death in 1972. While everyone knows of his primary role in the establishment of ISRO, perhaps many of us do not know that he was also the force behind the establishment of many other Indian institutes of repute, most notably the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) and the Nehru Foundation for Development.
11. Salim Ali
SƔlim Moizuddin Abdul Ali, born on November 12, 1896 in Mumbai, was an ornithologist and a naturalist. Salim Ali was among the first Indians to conduct systematic bird surveys across India and his bird books helped develop ornithology in the sub-continent.
This Birdman of India was the key figure behind the Bombay Natural History Society after 1947 and used his personal influence to garner government support for the organisation. He was awarded Indiaās second highest civilian honour, the Padma Vibhushan in 1976.
12. Har Gobind Khorana
Picture source
Born on January 9, 1922 at Raipur village in West Punjab (now in Pakistan), Khorana was an Indian-American biochemist who shared the 1968 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Marshall W. Nirenberg and Robert W. Holley for research that helped to show how the order of nucleotides in nucleic acids, which carry the genetic code of the cell, control the cellās synthesis of proteins.
In 1970, Khorana became the first to synthesize an artificial gene in a living cell. His work became the foundation for much of the later research in biotechnology and gene therapy.
How many are aware that
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