Aryabhata

AryabhataFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Aryabhata (disambiguation) .

Āryabhaṭa (आर्य�भ

Statue of Aryabhatta on the grounds of IUCAA,Pune. As there is no known

information regarding his appearance, any image of Aryabhata originates

from an artist's conception.

Born 476

Died 550

Era Gupta era

Region India

Main interests Maths, Astronomy

Major works Āryabhaṭīya, Arya-siddhanta

Aryabhata (IAST: Āryabhaṭa, Sanskrit: आर्य�भट) (476–550 CE) was the first in the line of great mathematician-

astronomers from the classical age of Indian mathematics and Indian astronomy. His most famous works are

the Āryabhaṭīya (499 CE, when he was 23 years old) and the Arya-siddhanta.

Contents

 [hide]

1 Biography

o 1.1 Name

o 1.2 Birth

o 1.3 Education

o 1.4 Other hypotheses

2 Works

o 2.1 Aryabhatiya

3 Mathematics

o 3.1 Place value system and zero

o 3.2 Approximation of π

o 3.3 Trigonometry

o 3.4 Indeterminate equations

o 3.5 Algebra

4 Astronomy

o 4.1 Motions of the solar system

o 4.2 Eclipses

o 4.3 Sidereal periods

o 4.4 Heliocentrism

5 Legacy

6 See also

7 References

o 7.1 Other references

8 External links

[edit]Biography

[edit]Name

While there is a tendency to misspell his name as "Aryabhatta" by analogy with other names having the

"bhatta" suffix, his name is properly spelled Aryabhata: every astronomical text spells his name thus,

[1] including Brahmagupta's references to him "in more than a hundred places by name".[2] Furthermore, in most

instances "Aryabhatta" does not fit the metre either.[1]

[edit]Birth

Aryabhata mentions in the Aryabhatiya that it was composed 3,630 years into the Kali Yuga, when he was 23

years old. This corresponds to 499 CE, and implies that he was born in 476 CE.

Aryabhata provides no information about his place of birth. The only information comes from Bhāskara I , who

describes Aryabhata as āśmakīya, "one belonging to the aśmaka country." It is widely attested that, during the

Buddha's time, a branch of the Aśmaka people settled in the region between the Narmada and Godavari rivers

in central India, today the South Gujarat–North Maharashtra region. Aryabhata is believed to have been born

there.[1][3] However, early Buddhist texts describe Ashmaka as being further south, in dakshinapath or

the Deccan, while other texts describe the Ashmakas as having fought Alexander,

[edit]Education

It is fairly certain that, at some point, he went to Kusumapura for advanced studies and that he lived there for

some time.[4] Both Hindu and Buddhist tradition, as well as Bhāskara I (CE 629), identify Kusumapura

as Pāṭaliputra, modern Patna.[1] A verse mentions that Aryabhata was the head of an institution (kulapa) at

Kusumapura, and, because the university of Nalanda was in Pataliputra at the time and had an astronomical

observatory, it is speculated that Aryabhata might have been the head of the Nalanda university as well.

[1] Aryabhata is also reputed to have set up an observatory at the Sun temple in Taregana, Bihar.[5]

[edit]Other hypotheses

It was suggested that Aryabhata may have been from Tamilnadu, but K. V. Sarma, an authority on Kerala's

astronomical tradition, disagreed[1] and pointed out several errors in this hypothesis.[6]

Aryabhata mentions "Lanka" on several occasions in the Aryabhatiya, but his "Lanka" is an abstraction,

standing for a point on the equator at the same longitude as his Ujjayini.[7]

[edit]Works

Aryabhata is the author of several treatises on mathematics and astronomy, some of which are lost. His major

work, Aryabhatiya, a compendium of mathematics and astronomy, was extensively referred to in the Indian

mathematical literature and has survived to modern times. The mathematical part of

the Aryabhatiya covers arithmetic, algebra, plane trigonometry, and spherical trigonometry. It also contains

continued fractions, quadratic equations, sums-of-power series, and a table of sines.

The Arya-siddhanta, a lost work on astronomical computations, is known through the writings of Aryabhata's

contemporary, Varahamihira, and later mathematicians and commentators,

includingBrahmagupta and Bhaskara I . This work appears to be based on the older Surya Siddhanta and uses

the midnight-day reckoning, as opposed to sunrise in Aryabhatiya. It also contained a description of several

astronomical instruments: the gnomon (shanku-yantra), a shadow instrument (chhAyA-yantra), possibly angle-

measuring devices, semicircular and circular (dhanur-yantra / chakra-yantra), a cylindrical stick yasti-yantra, an

umbrella-shaped device called the chhatra-yantra, and water clocks of at least two types, bow-shaped and

cylindrical.[3]

A third text, which may have survived in the Arabic translation, is Al ntf or Al-nanf. It claims that it is a

translation by Aryabhata, but the Sanskrit name of this work is not known. Probably dating from the 9th century,

it is mentioned by the Persian scholar and chronicler of India, Abū Rayhān al-Bīrūnī .[3]

[edit]Aryabhatiya

Direct details of Aryabhata's work are known only from the Aryabhatiya. The name "Aryabhatiya" is due to later

commentators. Aryabhata himself may not have given it a name. His disciple Bhaskara I calls

it Ashmakatantra (or the treatise from the Ashmaka). It is also occasionally referred to as Arya-shatas-

aShTa (literally, Aryabhata's 108), because there are 108 verses in the text. It is written in the very terse style

typical of sutra literature, in which each line is an aid to memory for a complex system. Thus, the explication of

meaning is due to commentators. The text consists of the 108 verses and 13 introductory verses, and is divided

into four pādas or chapters:

1. Gitikapada: (13 verses): large units of time—kalpa, manvantra, and yuga—which present a cosmology

different from earlier texts such as Lagadha's Vedanga Jyotisha  (c. 1st century BCE). There is also a

table of sines (jya), given in a single verse. The duration of the planetary revolutions during

a mahayuga is given as 4.32 million years.

2. Ganitapada (33 verses): covering mensuration (kṣetra vyāvahāra), arithmetic and geometric

progressions, gnomon / shadows (shanku-chhAyA), simple, quadratic, simultaneous,

andindeterminate equations (kuTTaka)

3. Kalakriyapada (25 verses): different units of time and a method for determining the positions of planets

for a given day, calculations concerning the intercalary month (adhikamAsa), kShaya-tithis, and a

seven-day week with names for the days of week.

4. Golapada (50 verses): Geometric/trigonometric aspects of the celestial sphere, features of

the ecliptic, celestial equator, node, shape of the earth, cause of day and night, rising of zodiacal

signson horizon, etc. In addition, some versions cite a few colophons added at the end, extolling the

virtues of the work, etc.

The Aryabhatiya presented a number of innovations in mathematics and astronomy in verse form, which were

influential for many centuries. The extreme brevity of the text was elaborated in commentaries by his disciple

Bhaskara I (Bhashya, c. 600 CE) and by Nilakantha Somayaji  in his Aryabhatiya Bhasya, (1465 CE).

[edit]Mathematics

[edit]Place value system and zero

The place-value system, first seen in the 3rd century Bakhshali Manuscript , was clearly in place in his work.

While he did not use a symbol for zero, the French mathematician Georges Ifrah explains that knowledge of

zero was implicit in Aryabhata's place-value system as a place holder for the powers of ten

with null coefficients [8]

However, Aryabhata did not use the Brahmi numerals. Continuing the Sanskritic tradition from Vedic times, he

used letters of the alphabet to denote numbers, expressing quantities, such as the table of sines in

a mnemonic form.[9]

[edit]Approximation of π

Aryabhata worked on the approximation for Pi (π), and may have come to the conclusion that π is irrational. In

the second part of the Aryabhatiyam (gaṇitapāda 10), he writes:

caturadhikam śatamaṣṭaguṇam dvāṣaṣṭistathā sahasrāṇām

ayutadvayaviṣkambhasyāsanno vṛttapariṇāhaḥ.

"Add four to 100, multiply by eight, and then add 62,000. By this rule the circumference of a circle with a

diameter of 20,000 can be approached."[10]

This implies that the ratio of the circumference to the diameter is ((4 + 100) × 8 + 62000)/20000 = 62832/20000

= 3.1416, which is accurate to five significant figures.

It is speculated that Aryabhata used the word āsanna (approaching), to mean that not only is this an

approximation but that the value is incommensurable (or irrational). If this is correct, it is quite a sophisticated

insight, because the irrationality of pi was proved in Europe only in 1761 by Lambert.[11]

After Aryabhatiya was translated into Arabic (c. 820 CE) this approximation was mentioned in Al-Khwarizmi's

book on algebra.[3]

[edit]Trigonometry

In Ganitapada 6, Aryabhata gives the area of a triangle as

tribhujasya phalashariram samadalakoti bhujardhasamvargah

that translates to: "for a triangle, the result of a perpendicular with the half-side is the area."[12]

Aryabhata discussed the concept of sine in his work by the name of ardha-jya. Literally, it means "half-

chord". For simplicity, people started calling it jya. When Arabic writers translated his works

fromSanskrit into Arabic, they referred it as jiba. However, in Arabic writings, vowels are omitted, and it

was abbreviated as jb. Later writers substituted it with jaib, meaning "pocket" or "fold (in a garment)". (In

Arabic, jiba is a meaningless word.) Later in the 12th century, when Gherardo of Cremona  translated these

writings from Arabic into Latin, he replaced the Arabic jaib with its Latin counterpart,sinus, which means

"cove" or "bay". And after that, the sinus became sine in English.[13]

[edit]Indeterminate equations

A problem of great interest to Indian mathematicians since ancient times has been to find integer solutions

to equations that have the form ax + by = c, a topic that has come to be known asdiophantine equations.

This is an example from Bhāskara's commentary on Aryabhatiya:

Find the number which gives 5 as the remainder when divided by 8, 4 as the remainder when divided

by 9, and 1 as the remainder when divided by 7

That is, find N = 8x+5 = 9y+4 = 7z+1. It turns out that the smallest value for N is 85. In general,

diophantine equations, such as this, can be notoriously difficult. They were discussed extensively in

ancient Vedic text Sulba Sutras , whose more ancient parts might date to 800 BCE. Aryabhata's

method of solving such problems is called the kuṭṭaka (कु� ट्टकु) method. Kuttaka means "pulverizing" or

"breaking into small pieces", and the method involves a recursive algorithm for writing the original

factors in smaller numbers. Today this algorithm, elaborated by Bhaskara in 621 CE, is the standard

method for solving first-order diophantine equations and is often referred to as the Aryabhata

algorithm.[14] The diophantine equations are of interest in cryptology, and the RSA Conference, 2006,

focused on the kuttaka method and earlier work in the Sulbasutras.

[edit]Algebra

In Aryabhatiya Aryabhata provided elegant results for the summation of series of squares and cubes:

[15]

and

[edit]Astronomy

Aryabhata's system of astronomy was called the audAyaka system, in which days are

reckoned from uday, dawn at lanka or "equator". Some of his later writings on astronomy,

which apparently proposed a second model (or ardha-rAtrikA, midnight) are lost but can be

partly reconstructed from the discussion in Brahmagupta's khanDakhAdyaka. In some texts,

he seems to ascribe the apparent motions of the heavens to the Earth's rotation. He also

treated the planet's orbits as elliptical rather than circular.[16][17]

[edit]Motions of the solar system

Aryabhata correctly insisted that the earth rotates about its axis daily, and that the apparent

movement of the stars is a relative motion caused by the rotation of the earth, contrary to the

then-prevailing view that the sky rotated. This is indicated in the first chapter of

the Aryabhatiya, where he gives the number of rotations of the earth in a yuga,[18] and made

more explicit in his gola chapter:[19]

In the same way that someone in a boat going forward sees an unmoving [object]

going backward, so [someone] on the equator sees the unmoving stars going

uniformly westward. The cause of rising and setting [is that] the sphere of the stars

together with the planets [apparently?] turns due west at the equator, constantly

pushed by the cosmic wind.

Aryabhata described a geocentric model of the solar system, in which the Sun and Moon are

each carried by epicycles. They in turn revolve around the Earth. In this model, which is also

found in thePaitāmahasiddhānta (c. CE 425), the motions of the planets are each governed

by two epicycles, a smaller manda (slow) and a larger śīghra (fast). [20] The order of the

planets in terms of distance from earth is taken as: the Moon, Mercury, Venus,

the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the asterisms."[3]

The positions and periods of the planets was calculated relative to uniformly moving points.

In the case of Mercury and Venus, they move around the Earth at the same mean speed as

the Sun. In the case of Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, they move around the Earth at specific

speeds, representing each planet's motion through the zodiac. Most historians of astronomy

consider that this two-epicycle model reflects elements of pre-Ptolemaic Greek astronomy.

[21] Another element in Aryabhata's model, the śīghrocca, the basic planetary period in

relation to the Sun, is seen by some historians as a sign of an underlying heliocentric model.

[22]

[edit]Eclipses

Solar and lunar eclipses were scientifically explained by Aryabhata. Aryabhata states that

the Moon and planets shine by reflected sunlight. Instead of the prevailing cosmogony in

which eclipses were caused by pseudo-planetary nodes Rahu and Ketu, he explains

eclipses in terms of shadows cast by and falling on Earth. Thus, the lunar eclipse occurs

when the moon enters into the Earth's shadow (verse gola.37). He discusses at length the

size and extent of the Earth's shadow (verses gola.38–48) and then provides the

computation and the size of the eclipsed part during an eclipse. Later Indian astronomers

improved on the calculations, but Aryabhata's methods provided the core. His computational

paradigm was so accurate that 18th century scientist Guillaume Le Gentil, during a visit to

Pondicherry, India, found the Indian computations of the duration of the lunar eclipse of 30

August 1765 to be short by 41 seconds, whereas his charts (by Tobias Mayer, 1752) were

long by 68 seconds.[3]

[edit]Sidereal periods

Considered in modern English units of time, Aryabhata calculated the sidereal rotation (the

rotation of the earth referencing the fixed stars) as 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4.1 seconds;

[23] the modern value is 23:56:4.091. Similarly, his value for the length of the sidereal year at

365 days, 6 hours, 12 minutes, and 30 seconds (365.25858 days)[24] is an error of 3 minutes

and 20 seconds over the length of a year (365.25636 days).[25]

[edit]Heliocentrism

As mentioned, Aryabhata advocated an astronomical model in which the Earth turns on its

own axis. His model also gave corrections (the śīgra anomaly) for the speeds of the planets

in the sky in terms of the mean speed of the sun. Thus, it has been suggested that

Aryabhata's calculations were based on an underlying heliocentric model, in which the

planets orbit the Sun,[26][27][28] though this has been rebutted.[29] It has also been suggested

that aspects of Aryabhata's system may have been derived from an earlier, likely pre-

Ptolemaic Greek, heliocentric model of which Indian astronomers were unaware,[30] though

the evidence is scant.[31] The general consensus is that a synodic anomaly (depending on the

position of the sun) does not imply a physically heliocentric orbit (such corrections being also

present in late Babylonian astronomical texts), and that Aryabhata's system was not explicitly

heliocentric.[32]

[edit]Legacy

Aryabhata's work was of great influence in the Indian astronomical tradition and influenced

several neighbouring cultures through translations. The Arabic translation during the Islamic

Golden Age (c. 820 CE), was particularly influential. Some of his results are cited by Al-

Khwarizmi and in the 10th century Al-Biruni stated that Aryabhata's followers believed that

the Earth rotated on its axis.

His definitions of sine (jya), cosine (kojya), versine (utkrama-jya), and inverse sine (otkram

jya) influenced the birth of trigonometry. He was also the first to specify sine

and versine (1 − cos x) tables, in 3.75° intervals from 0° to 90°, to an accuracy of 4 decimal

places.

In fact, modern names "sine" and "cosine" are mistranscriptions of the

words jya and kojya as introduced by Aryabhata. As mentioned, they were translated

as jiba and kojiba in Arabic and then misunderstood by Gerard of Cremona while translating

an Arabic geometry text to Latin. He assumed that jiba was the Arabic word jaib, which

means "fold in a garment", L. sinus (c. 1150).[33]

Aryabhata's astronomical calculation methods were also very influential. Along with the

trigonometric tables, they came to be widely used in the Islamic world and used to compute

many Arabicastronomical tables (zijes). In particular, the astronomical tables in the work of

the Arabic Spain scientist Al-Zarqali (11th century) were translated into Latin as the Tables of

Toledo (12th c.) and remained the most accurate ephemeris used in Europe for centuries.

Calendric calculations devised by Aryabhata and his followers have been in continuous use

in India for the practical purposes of fixing the Panchangam (the Hindu calendar). In the

Islamic world, they formed the basis of the Jalali calendar  introduced in 1073 CE by a group

of astronomers including Omar Khayyam,[34] versions of which (modified in 1925) are the

national calendars in use in Iran andAfghanistan today. The dates of the Jalali calendar are

based on actual solar transit, as in Aryabhata and earlier Siddhanta calendars. This type of

calendar requires an ephemeris for calculating dates. Although dates were difficult to

compute, seasonal errors were less in the Jalali calendar than in the Gregorian calendar.

India's first satellite Aryabhata and the lunar crater Aryabhata are named in his honour. An

Institute for conducting research in astronomy, astrophysics and atmospheric sciences is

the Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences  (ARIES) near Nainital, India.

The inter-school Aryabhata Maths Competition  is also named after him,[35] as is Bacillus

aryabhata, a species of bacteria discovered by ISRO scientists in 2009.[36]

Homi J. BhabhaFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

  (Redirected from Homi Bhabha )

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2011)

Homi Bhaba

Homi Bhaba (1909-1966)

Born 30 October 1909

Bombay, British India, Present-day India

Died 24 January 1966 (aged 56)

Mont Blanc, France

Residence New Delhi, India

Citizenship India

Nationality Indian

Fields Nuclear Physics

Institutions Atomic Energy Commission of India

Tata Institute of Fundamental Research

Cavendish Laboratory

Indian Institute of Science

Indian National Committee for Space Research

Alma mater Elphinstone College

Royal Institute of Science

University of Cambridge

Doctoral advisor Ralph H. Fowler

Other academic advisors Paul Dirac

Known for Indian nuclear program(also known as Father of India

nuclear program)

Cosmic Rays

point particles

Notable awards Padma Bhushan (1954)

Notes

Bhabha was a close and personal friend of Prime Minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru[citation

needed]

Not to be confused with Homi K. Bhabha

Homi Jehangir Bhabha, FRS (30 October 1909 – 24 January 1966) was an Indian nuclear physicist and

the chief architect of the Indian atomic energy program. He was also responsible for the establishment of

two well-known research institutions, namely the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), and the

Atomic Energy Establishment at Trombay (which after Bhabha's death was renamed as the Bhabha

Atomic Research Centre (BARC)). As a scientist, he is remembered for deriving a correct expression for

the probability of scattering positrons by electrons, a process now known as Bhabha scattering . For his

significant contributions to the development of atomic energy in India, he is known as the father of India's

nuclear program. World War II broke out in September 1939 while Bhabha was vacationing in India. He

chose to remain in India until the war ended. In the meantime, he accepted a position at the Indian Institute

of Science in Bangalore, headed by Nobel laureate C. V. Raman. He established the Cosmic Ray

Research Unit at the institute, and began to work on the theory of the movement of point particles. In 1945,

he established the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Bombay, and the Atomic Energy

Commission of India three years later. In the 1950s, Bhabha represented India in International Atomic

Energy Forums, and served as President of the United Nations Conference on the Peaceful Uses of

Atomic Energy inGeneva, Switzerland in 1955. He was awarded Padma Bhushan  by Government of India

in 1954. He later served as the member of the Indian Cabinet's Scientific Advisory Committee and set up

the Indian National Committee for Space Research with Vikram Sarabhai . In January 1966, Bhabha died

in a plane crash near Mont Blanc, while heading to Vienna, Austria to attend a meeting of the International

Atomic Energy Agency's Scientific Advisory Committee.

Contents

 [hide]

1 Early life

2 Higher education and research at Cambridge

3 Research in theoretical physics

4 Return to India

5 Atomic Energy in India

6 Death and legacy

7 References

8 External References

[edit]Early life

Bhabha was born into a wealthy and prominent Parsi family, through which he was related to Dinshaw

Maneckji Petit, Muhammad Ali Jinnah andDorab Tata. He received his early education at

Bombay's Cathedral Grammar School and entered Elphinstone College  at age 15 after passing hisSenior

Cambridge Examination with Honors.His parents had sent him for higher studies to Cambridge so that he

would pursue a career in Tata Industries. Dr.Bhabha however managed to convince his parents that his

interests were limited to physics only. He then attended the Royal Institute of Science until 1927 before

joining Caius College of Cambridge University. This was due to the insistence of his father and his

uncle Dorab Tata , who planned for Bhabha to obtain an engineering degree from Cambridge and then

return to India, where he would join the Tata Iron and Steel Company in Jamshedpur.

[edit]Higher education and research at Cambridge

At Cambridge Bhabha's interests gradually shifted to theoretical physics. In 1928 Bhabha in a letter to his

father. Bhabha's father understood his son's predicament, and he agreed to finance his studies in

mathematics provided that he obtain first class on his Mechanical Sciences Triposexam. Bhabha took the

Tripos exam in June 1930 and passed with first class. Afterwards, he embarked on his mathematical

studies under Paul Dirac to complete the Mathematics Tripos. After finishing Mathematical Tripos Dr.

Bhabha worked for short periods with Wolfgang Pauli at Zurich and with Enrico Fermi  at Rome. In 1934 he

was awarded the Isaac Newton Studentship which enabled him complete his Ph. D under Dr. R. H.

Fowler, who was also the Ph. D thesis advisor for Dr. Chandrasekhar. Meanwhile, he worked at

the Cavendish Laboratory while working towards his doctorate in theoretical physics. At the time, the

laboratory was the center of a number of scientific breakthroughs. James Chadwick had discovered

the neutron, John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton transmuted lithium with high-energy protons, and Patrick

Blackett and Giuseppe Occhialini usedcloud chambers to demonstrate the production of electron

pairs and showers by gamma radiation. During the 1931–1932 academic year, Bhabha was awarded the

Salomons Studentship in Engineering. In 1932, he obtained first class on his Mathematical Tripos and was

awarded the Rouse Ball traveling studentship in mathematics.

[edit]Research in theoretical physics

In January 1933, Bhabha published his first scientific paper, "The Absorption of Cosmic radition. In the

publication, Bhabha offered an explanation of the absorption features and electron shower production in

cosmic rays.The paper helped him win the Isaac Newton Studentship in 1934, which he held for the next

three years. The following year, he completed his doctoral studies in theoretical physics under Ralph H.

Fowler. During his studentship, he split his time working at Cambridge and with Niels Bohr  in Copenhagen.

In 1935, Bhabha published a paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, Series A, in which performed

the first calculation to determine the cross section of electron-positron scattering. Electron-positron

scattering was later named Bhabha scattering , in honor of his contributions in the field[citation needed].

In 1936, the two published a paper, "The Passage of Fast Electrons and the Theory of Cosmic Showers" in

the Proceedings of the Royal Society, Series A, in which they used their theory to describe how primary

cosmic rays from outer space interact with the upper atmosphere to produce particles observed at the

ground level. Bhabha and Heitler then made numerical estimates of the number of electrons in the

cascade process at different altitudes for different electron initiation energies. The calculations agreed with

the experimental observations of cosmic ray showers made by Bruno Rossiand Pierre Victor Auger a few

years before. Bhabha later concluded that observations of the properties of such particles would lead to

the straightforward experimental verification of Albert Einstein's theory of relativity.

In 1937, Dr. Bhabha published paper on the penetrating component of the cosmic radiation in the Proc. of

the Royal Society stating that the experimental cosmic ray data would find a natural explanation if the

secondary cosmic radiation in the atmosphere consisted of charged particles of mass intermediate

between electron and proton, setting the mass around 100 electron masses. Dr. Bhabha’s prediction was

soon corroborated by the discovery of Seth Neddermeyer and Carl David Anderson, and Street and

Stevenson who found particles of mass ~ 200 electron masses in their cloud chamber experiments. These

particles were then given the name 'Meson’. In the same year Bhabha was awarded the Senior

Studentship of the 1851 Exhibition, which helped him continue his work at Cambridge until the outbreak

of World War II in 1939[citation needed].

[edit]Return to India

File:Bhabha And Nehru.jpg

Bhabha with Jawaharlal Nehru

In September 1939, Bhabha was in India for a brief holiday when World War II broke out, and he decided

not to return to England for the time being. He accepted an offer to serve as the Reader in the Physics

Department of the Indian Institute of Science, then headed by renowned physicist C. V. Raman. He

received a special research grant from the Sir Dorab Tata Trust, which he used to establish the Cosmic

Ray Research Unit at the institute. Bhabha selected a few students, includingHarish-Chandra, to work with

him. Later, on 20 March 1941, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society . With the help of J. R. D.

Tata, he played an instrumental role in the establishment of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in

Bombay.

[edit]Atomic Energy in India

File:Bhabha .jpg

Bhabha explaining Cosmic Rays

Dr. Bhabha’s principal philosophy was that the large scale development of science in India was the main

ingredient needed to achieve technological advancement. He was convinced that the task of fast

developing a country was the problem of establishing modern science in it, and building its economy on

modern science and technology.

In his address to the Assembly of Council of Scientific Unions on Jan. 4, 1966, Dr. Bhabha commented on

Science and Development in India during the past 20 years:

“It is interesting to note that practically all the ancient civilizations of the world -Persia, Egypt, India, and China- were in countries which are today underdeveloped. What the developed countries have and the underdeveloped lack is modern science and an economy based on modern technology. The problem of developing the underdeveloped counties is therefore the problem of establishing modern science in them and transforming their economy to one based on modern science and technology. ”

When Bhabha was working at the Indian Institute of Science, there was no institute in India which had the

necessary facilities for original work in nuclear physics, cosmic rays, high energy physics, and other

frontiers of knowledge in physics. This prompted him to send a proposal in March 1944 to the Sir Dorab J.

Tata Trust for establishing 'a vigorous school of research in fundamental physics'. In his proposal he

wrote :

“There is at the moment in India no big school of research in the fundamental problems of physics, both theoretical and experimental. There are, however, scattered all over India competent workers who are not doing as good work as they would do if brought together in one place under proper direction. It is absolutely in the interest of India to have a vigorous school of research in fundamental physics, for such a school forms the spearhead of research not only in less advanced branches of physics but also in problems of immediate practical application in industry. If much of the applied research done in India today is disappointing or of very inferior quality it is entirely due to the absence of sufficient number of outstanding pure research workers who would set the standard of good research and act on the directing boards in an advisory capacity ... Moreover, when nuclear energy has been successfully applied for power production in say a couple of decades from now, India will not have to look abroad for its experts but will find them ready at hand. I do not think that anyone acquainted with scientific development in other countries would deny the need in India for such a school as I propose.

The subjects on which research and advanced teaching would be done would be theoretical

physics, especially on fundamental problems and with special reference to cosmic rays and

nuclear physics, and experimental research on cosmic rays. It is neither possible nor desirable to

separate nuclear physics from cosmic rays since the two are closely connected theoretically.[1] ”The trustees of Sir Dorab J. Tata Trust decided to accept Bhabha's proposal and financial responsibility for

starting the Institute in April 1944. Bombay was chosen as the location for the prosed Institute as the

Government of Bombay showed interest in becoming a joint founder of the proposed institute. The

institute, named Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, was inaugurated in 1945 in 540 square meters of

hired space in an existing building. In 1948 the Institute was moved into the old buildings of the Royal

Yacht club. When Bhabha realized that technology development for the atomic energy programme could

no longer be carried out within TIFR he proposed to the government to build a new laboratory entirely

devoted to this purpose. For this purpose, 1200 acres of land was acquired at Trombay from the Bombay

Government. Thus the Atomic Energy Establishment Trombay (AEET) started functioning in 1954. The

same year the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) was also established.[2] He represented India in

International Atomic Energy Forums, and as President of the United Nations Conference on the Peaceful

Uses of Atomic Energy, in Geneva, Switzerland in 1955. He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of

the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1958.[3]

[edit]Death and legacy

He died when Air India Flight 101 crashed near Mont Blanc on January 24, 1966. Many possible theories

have been advanced for the aircrash, including a conspiracy theory in which CIA is involved in order to

paralyze Indian nuclear weapon programme[citation needed]. The atomic energy centre in Trombay was renamed

as Bhabha Atomic Research Centre in his honour. In addition to being an able scientist and administrator,

Bhabha was also a painter and a classical music and opera enthusiast, besides being an amateur

botanist[citation needed].He is one of the most prominent scientists that India has ever had.

After his death, the Atomic Energy Establishment at Trombay was renamed as the Bhabha Atomic

Research Centre in his honour. Bhabha also encouraged research in electronics, space science,radio

astronomy and microbiology[citation needed]. The famed radio telescope at Ooty, India was his initiative, and it

became a reality in 1970. The Homi Bhabha Fellowship Council has been giving the Homi Bhabha

Fellowships since 1967 Other noted institutions in his name are the Homi Bhabha National Institute , an

Indian deemed university and the Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education ,Mumbai, India.

Central to setting up these organizations lay three main themes in the Homi Bhabha’s philosophy for

spurring growth of science and technology in India:

(1) growing a large group of trained scientists in the field of nuclear physics so that when atomic energy

became a reality, India had the trained scientists at hand to avail of this energy source for power

production.

(2) spreading sophisticated technology in the fields of electronics, high vacuum techniques and nuclear

physics to colleges, institutes and industry.

(3) implanting and sharing highly trained scientists in universities as teachers.

C. V. RamanFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, FRS

Born7 November 1888Thiruvanaikoil, Tiruchirappalli, Madras Presidency, India

Died21 November 1970 (aged 82)Bangalore, Karnataka, India

Nationality Indian

Fields Physics

Institutions

Indian Finance DepartmentUniversity of CalcuttaIndian Association for the Cultivation of ScienceIndian Institute of Science

Alma mater University of Madras

Doctoral students G. N. Ramachandran

Known for Raman effect

Notable awards

Knight Bachelor (1929)Nobel Prize in Physics (1930)Bharat Ratna (1954)Lenin Peace Prize (1957)

Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, FRS (Tamil: சந்தி�ரசேசகர வெங்கடர�மன்) (7 November 1888 – 21 November 1970) was an Indian physicist whose work was influential in the growth of science in the world. He was the recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1930 for the discovery that when light traverses a transparent material, some of the light that is deflected changes in wavelength. This phenomenon is now called Raman scattering and is the result of the Raman effect.

Contents

[hide]

1 Early years 2 Career 3 Personal life 4 Honours and awards 5 Publications 6 See also 7 Notes 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External links

[edit] Early years

Venkata Raman, a Tamil Brahmin, was born at Thiruvanaikaval, near Tiruchirappalli, Madras Presidency to R. Chandrasekhara Iyer (b. 1866) and Parvati Ammal (Saptarshi Parvati).[1] He was the second of their eight children. At an early age, Raman moved to the city of Vizag, Andhra Pradesh. Studied in St.Aloysius Anglo-Indian High School. His father was a lecturer in Mathematics and physics. Raman's father, who initially taught in a local school for many years and later became a lecturer in mathematics and physics in Mrs. A.V. Narasimha Rao College, Vishakapatnam (then Vizagapatnam) in Andhra Pradesh. Raman passed his matriculation examination at the age of 11 and he passed his F.A. examination (equivalent to today's Intermediate) with a scholarship at 13. In 1903 Raman joined the Presidency College, Chennai (then Madras). In 1904, he gained his B.Sc., winning the first place and the gold medal in physics. In 1907, he gained his M.Sc., obtaining the highest distinctions. Raman said:

“ I finished my school and college career and my university examination at the age of eighteen. In this short span of years had been compressed the study of four languages and of a great variety of diverse subjects, in several cases up to the highest university standards. A list of all the volumes I had to study would be terrifying length. Did these books influence me? Yes, in the narrow sense of making me tolerably familiar with subjects of so diverse as Ancient Greek and Roman History, Modern Indian and European History, Formal Logic, Economics, Monetary Theory and Public Finance, the late Sanskrit writers and minor English authors, to say nothing of physiography, chemistry and dozen branches of Pure and Applied Mathematics, and of Experimental and Theoretical Physics. ”

Though Raman proved his brilliance in scientific investigations but as were the norms of those days he was not encouraged to take up science as a career. At the instance of his father Raman took the Financial Civil Service (FCS) examination. He stood first in the examination and in the middle of 1907 Raman proceeded to Kolkata (then Calcutta) to join the Indian Finance Department as Assistant Accountant General. He was then 18½ years old. His starting salary was Rs. 400 per month, a fabulous sum in those days. At that point of time perhaps nobody would have even dreamt that Raman would again venture into the pursuits of science. Raman's prospects in the Government service were too lucrative. And during those days opportunities for doing research were rare. But then one day while going to office Raman saw a signboard with the words "Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science" written on it. The address was 210, Bowbazar Street. On his way back he came to the Association where he first met an individual named Ashutosh Dey who was to be Raman's assistant for 25 years. Dey took Raman to the Honorary Secretary of the Association, Amrit Lal Sircar, who was overjoyed when he came to know about Raman's intention -- to do research at the Association's laboratory. Amrit Lal had reason to be overjoyed because it was his father Mahendra Lal Sircar (1833-1904), a man of vision, who established the Association in 1876. This Association happened to be the first institute to be established in India solely for carrying out scientific investigations. So when Amrit Lal Sircar saw Raman, perhaps he felt that he (Raman) would realise his father's dream.

[edit] Career

In 1917, Raman resigned from his government service and took up the newly created Palit Professorship in Physics at the University of Calcutta. At the same time, he continued doing research at the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, Calcutta, where he became the Honorary Secretary. Raman used to refer to this period as the golden era of his career. Many students gathered around him at the IACS and the University of Calcutta.

Till 1917 Raman continued his research at the Association in his spare time. Doing research in his spare time and that too with very limited facilities Raman could publish his research findings in leading international journals like Nature, The Philosophical Magazine and Physics Review. During this period he published 30 original research papers. His research carried during this period mainly centred on areas of vibrations and acoustics. He studied a number of musical instruments viz., ectara, violin, tambura, veena, mridangam, tabla etc. He published a monograph on his extensive studies on the violin. The monograph was titled 'On the Mechanical Theory of

Vibrations of Musical Instruments of the Violin Family with Experimental Verifications of the Results Part- I'.

Energy level diagram showing the states involved in Raman signal.

On February 28, 1928, through his experiments on the scattering of light, he discovered the Raman effect. It was instantly clear that this discovery was an important one. It gave further proof of the quantum nature of light. Raman spectroscopy came to be based on this phenomenon, and Ernest Rutherford referred to it in his presidential address to the Royal Society in 1929. Raman was president of the 16th session of the Indian Science Congress in 1929. He was conferred a knighthood, and medals and honorary doctorates by various universities. Raman was confident of winning the Nobel Prize in Physics as well, and was disappointed when the Nobel Prize went to Richardson in 1928 and to de Broglie in 1929. He was so confident of winning the prize in 1930 that he booked tickets in July, even though the awards were to be announced in November, and would scan each day's newspaper for announcement of the prize, tossing it away if it did not carry the news. He did eventually win the 1930 Nobel Prize in Physics "for his work on the scattering of light and for the discovery of the effect named after him". He was the first Asian and first non-White to receive any Nobel Prize in the sciences. Before him Rabindranath Tagore (also Indian) had received the Nobel Prize for Literature.

C.V Raman & Bhagavantam, discovered the quantum photon spin in 1932, which further confirmed the quantum nature of light. [1]

Raman also worked on the acoustics of musical instruments. He worked out the theory of transverse vibration of bowed strings, on the basis of superposition velocities. He was also the first to investigate the harmonic nature of the sound of the Indian drums such as the tabla and the mridangam.

Raman and his student of mim high school, provided the correct theoretical explanation for the acousto-optic effect (light scattering by sound waves), in a series of articles resulting in the celebrated Raman-Nath theory. Modulators, and switching systems based on this effect have enabled optical communication components based on laser systems.

In 1934, Raman became the assistant director of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, where two years later he continued as a professor of physics. Other investigations carried out by

Raman were experimental and theoretical studies on the diffraction of light by acoustic waves of ultrasonic and hypersonic frequencies (published 1934-1942), and those on the effects produced by X-rays on infrared vibrations in crystals exposed to ordinary light.

He also started a company called cv Chemical and Manufacturing Co. Ltd. in 1943 along with Dr. Krishnamurthy. The Company during its 60 year history, established four factories in Southern India. In 1947, he was appointed as the first National Professor by the new government of Independent India.

In 1948, Raman, through studying the spectroscopic behavior of crystals, approached in a new manner fundamental problems of crystal dynamics. He dealt with the structure and properties of diamond, the structure and optical behavior of numerous iridescent substances (labradorite, pearly feldspar, agate, opal, and pearls). Among his other interests were the optics of colloids, electrical and magnetic anisotropy, and the physiology of human vision.

[edit] Personal life

Raman retired from the Indian Institute of Science in 1948 and established the Raman Research Institute in Bangalore, Karnataka a year later. He served as its director and remained active there until his death in 1970, in Bangalore, at the age of 82.

He was married on 6 May 1907 to Lokasundari Ammal with whom he had two sons, Chandrasekhar and Radhakrishnan.

C.V. Raman was the paternal uncle of Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, who later won the Nobel Prize in Physics (1983) for his discovery of the Chandrasekhar limit in 1931 and for his subsequent work on the nuclear reactions necessary for stellar evolution.

Raman was a staunch patriot and he had great faith in India's potential for progress. He excelled under the most adverse circumstances. When he received the Nobel, he quoted:

“ When the Nobel award was announced I saw it as a personal triumph, an achievement for me and my collaborators -- a recognition for a very remarkable discovery, for reaching the goal I had pursued for 7 years. But when I sat in that crowded hall and I saw the sea of western faces surrounding me, and I, the only Indian, in my turban and closed coat, it dawned on me that I was really representing my people and my country. I felt truly humble when I received the Prize from King Gustav; it was a moment of great emotion but I could restrain myself. Then I turned round and saw the British Union Jack under which I had been sitting and it was then that I realised that my poor country, India, did not even have a flag of her own - and it was this that triggered off my complete breakdown.

Jagadish Chandra BoseFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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আচা�র্য� জগদীশ চান্দ্র বসু�Acharyo-Jogodiish-Chondro-Boshū

Acharya Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose, CSI, CIE, FRS

Jagadish Chandra Bose in Royal Institution, London

Born30 November 1858Bikrampur, Bengal Presidency, British India

Died23 November 1937 (aged 78)Giridih, Bengal, British India

Residence Kolkata, Bengal, British India

Nationality British Indian

FieldsPhysics, Biophysics, Biology, Botany, Archaeology, Bengali Literature, Bangla Science Fiction

InstitutionsUniversity of CalcuttaUniversity of CambridgeUniversity of London

Alma materSt. Xavier's College, CalcuttaUniversity of Cambridge

Doctoral advisor John Strutt (Lord Rayleigh)

Notable students Satyendra Nath Bose

Known for Millimetre wavesRadio

Crescograph Plant science

Notable awards

Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) (1903)Companion of the Order of the Star of India (CSI) (1911)Knight Bachelor (1917)

Acharya Sir [1] Jagadish Chandra Bose, CSI,[2] CIE,[3] FRS (Bengali: জগদী�শ চন্দ্র বসু Jôgodish Chôndro Boshu) (30 November 1858 – 23 November 1937) was a Bengali polymath: a physicist, biologist, botanist, archaeologist, as well as an early writer of science fiction.[4] He pioneered the investigation of radio and microwave optics, made very significant contributions to plant science, and laid the foundations of experimental science in the Indian subcontinent.[5] IEEE named him one of the fathers of radio science.[6] He is also considered the father of Bengali science fiction. He was the first person from the Indian subcontinent to receive a US patent, in 1904.

Born during the British Raj, Bose graduated from St. Xavier's College, Calcutta. He then went to the University of London to study medicine, but could not pursue studies in medicine due to health problems. Instead, he conducted his research with the Nobel Laureate Lord Rayleigh at Cambridge and returned to India. He then joined the Presidency College of University of Calcutta as a Professor of Physics. There, despite racial discrimination and a lack of funding and equipment, Bose carried on his scientific research. He made remarkable progress in his research of remote wireless signaling and was the first to use semiconductor junctions to detect radio signals. However, instead of trying to gain commercial benefit from this invention Bose made his inventions public in order to allow others to further develop his research.

Bose subsequently made a number of pioneering discoveries in plant physiology. He used his own invention, the crescograph, to measure plant response to various stimuli, and thereby scientifically proved parallelism between animal and plant tissues. Although Bose filed for a patent for one of his inventions due to peer pressure, his reluctance to any form of patenting was well known.

He has been recognised for his many contributions to modern science.

Contents

[hide]

1 Early life and education 2 Joining Presidency College 3 Radio research 4 Plant research 5 Electrical response in metals

6 Science fiction 7 Bose and patents 8 Legacy 9 Publications 10 Honors 11 Notes 12 References and general information 13 Further reading 14 External links

[edit] Early life and education

Sir Jagdish Chandra Bose was born in Bikrampur, Bengal, now Munshiganj District of Bangladesh) on November 30, 1870. His father, Bhagawan Chandra Bose, was a Brahmo and leader of the Brahmo Samaj and worked as a deputy magistrate/ assistant commissioner in Faridpur,[7] Bardhaman and other places.[8] His family hailed from the village Rarikhal, Bikrampur, in the current day Munshiganj District of Bangladesh.[9]

Bose’s education started in a vernacular school, because his father believed that one must know one's own mother tongue before beginning English, and that one should know also one's own people.[citation needed] Speaking at the Bikrampur Conference in 1915, Bose said:

“At that time, sending children to English schools was an aristocratic status symbol. In the vernacular school, to which I was sent, the son of the Muslim attendant of my father sat on my right side, and the son of a fisherman sat on my left. They were my playmates. I listened spellbound to their stories of birds, animals and aquatic creatures. Perhaps these stories created in my mind a keen interest in investigating the workings of Nature. When I returned home from school accompanied by my school fellows, my mother welcomed and fed all of us without discrimination. Although she was an orthodox old fashioned lady, she never considered herself guilty of impiety by treating these ‘untouchables’ as her own children. It was because of my childhood friendship with them that I could never feel that there were ‘creatures’ who might be labelled ‘low-caste’. I never realised that there existed a ‘problem’ common to the two communities, Hindus and Muslims.”[8]

Bose joined the Hare School in 1869 and then St. Xavier’s School at Kolkata. In 1875, he passed the Entrance Examination (equivalent to school graduation) of University of Calcutta and was admitted to St. Xavier's College, Calcutta. At St. Xavier's, Bose came in contact with Jesuit Father Eugene Lafont, who played a significant role in developing his interest to natural science.[8][9] He received a bachelor's degree from University of Calcutta in 1879.[7]

Bose wanted to go to England to compete for the Indian Civil Service. However, his father, a civil servant himself, canceled the plan. He wished his son to be a scholar, who would “rule nobody but himself.”[citation needed] Bose went to England to study Medicine at the University of London. However, he had to quit because of ill health.[10] The odour in the dissection rooms is also said to have exacerbated his illness.[7]

Through the recommendation of Anand Mohan, his brother-in-law (sister's husband) and the first Indian wrangler, he secured admission in Christ's College, Cambridge to study Natural Science. He received the Natural Science Tripos from the University of Cambridge and a BSc from the University of London in 1884.[11] Among Bose’s teachers at Cambridge were Lord Rayleigh, Michael Foster, James Dewar, Francis Darwin, Francis Balfour, and Sidney Vines. At the time when Bose was a student at Cambridge, Prafulla Chandra Roy was a student at Edinburgh. They met in London and became intimate friends.[7][8]

On the second day of a two-day seminar held on the occasion of 150th anniversary of Jagadish Chandra Bose on 28–29 July at The Asiatic Society, Kolkata Professor Shibaji Raha, Director of the Bose Institute, Kolkata told in his valedictory address that he had personally checked the register of the Cambridge University to confirm the fact that in addition to Tripos he received an M.A. as well from it in 1884.

[edit] Joining Presidency College

Jagadish Chandra Bose

Bose returned to India in 1885, carrying a letter from Fawcett, the economist to Lord Ripon, Viceroy of India. On Lord Ripon’s request Sir Alfred Croft, the Director of Public Instruction, appointed Bose officiating professor of physics in Presidency College. The principal, C. H. Tawney, protested against the appointment but had to accept it.[12]

Bose was not provided with facilities for research. On the contrary, he was a ‘victim of racialism’ with regard to his salary.[12] In those days, an Indian professor was paid Rs. 200 per month, while his European counterpart received Rs. 300 per month. Since Bose was officiating, he was offered a salary of only Rs. 100 per month.[13] With remarkable sense of self respect and national pride he decided on a new form of protest.[12] Bose refused to accept the salary cheque. In fact, he continued his teaching assignment for three years without

accepting any salary.[14] Finally both the Director of Public Instruction and the Principal of the Presidency College fully realised the value of Bose’s skill in teaching and also his lofty character. As a result his appointment was made permanent with retrospective effect. He was given the full salary for the previous three years in a lump sum.[7]

Presidency College lacked a proper laboratory. Bose had to conduct his research in a small 24-square-foot (2.2 m2) room.[7] He devised equipment for the research with the help of one untrained tinsmith.[12] Sister Nivedita wrote, “I was horrified to find the way in which a great worker could be subjected to continuous annoyance and petty difficulties ... The college routine was made as arduous as possible for him, so that he could not have the time he needed for investigation.” After his daily grind, which he of course performed with great conscientiousness, he carried out his research far into the night, in a small room in his college.[12]

Moreover, the policy of the British government for its colonies was not conducive to attempts at original research. Bose spent his hard-earned money for making experimental equipment. Within a decade of his joining Presidency College, he emerged a pioneer in the incipient research field of wireless waves.[12]

[edit] Radio research

See also: Invention of radio

The British theoretical physicist James Clerk Maxwell mathematically predicted the existence of electromagnetic waves of diverse wavelengths, but he died in 1879 before his prediction was experimentally verified. British physicist Oliver Lodge demonstrated the existence of Maxwell’s waves transmitted along wires in 1887-88. The German physicist Heinrich Hertz showed experimentally, in 1888, the existence of electromagnetic waves in free space. Subsequently, Lodge pursued Hertz’s work and delivered a commemorative lecture in June 1894 (after Hertz’s death) and published it in book form. Lodge’s work caught the attention of scientists in different countries including Bose in India.[15]

The first remarkable aspect of Bose’s follow up microwave research was that he reduced the waves to the millimetre level (about 5 mm wavelength). He realised the disadvantages of long waves for studying their light-like properties.[15]

In 1893, Nikola Tesla demonstrated the first public radio communication.[16] One year later, during a November 1894 (or 1895[15]) public demonstration at Town Hall of Kolkata, Bose ignited gunpowder and rang a bell at a distance using millimetre range wavelength microwaves.[14] Lieutenant Governor Sir William Mackenzie witnessed Bose's demonstration in the Kolkata Town Hall. Bose wrote in a Bengali essay, Adrisya Alok (Invisible Light), “The invisible light can easily pass through brick walls, buildings etc. Therefore, messages can be transmitted by means of it without the mediation of wires.”[15] In Russia, Popov performed similar experiments. In December 1895, Popov's records indicate that he hoped for distant signalling with radio waves.[17]

Bose’s first scientific paper, “On polarisation of electric rays by double-refracting crystals” was communicated to the Asiatic Society of Bengal in May 1895, within a year of Lodge’s paper. His second paper was communicated to the Royal Society of London by Lord Rayleigh in October 1895. In December 1895, the London journal the Electrician (Vol 36) published Bose’s paper, “On a new electro-polariscope”. At that time, the word ‘coherer’, coined by Lodge, was used in the English-speaking world for Hertzian wave receivers or detectors. The Electrician readily commented on Bose’s coherer. (December 1895). The Englishman (18 January 1896) quoted from the Electrician and commented as follows:

”Should Professor Bose succeed in perfecting and patenting his ‘Coherer’, we may in time see the whole system of coast lighting throughout the navigable world revolutionised by a Bengali scientist working single handed in our Presidency College Laboratory.”

Bose planned to “perfect his coherer” but never thought of patenting it.[15]

In May 1897, two years after Bose's public demonstration in Kolkata, Marconi conducted his wireless signalling experiment on Salisbury Plain.[17] Bose went to London on a lecture tour in 1896 and met Marconi, who was conducting wireless experiments for the British post office. In an interview, Bose expressed disinterest in commercial telegraphy and suggested others use his research work. In 1899, Bose announced the development of a "iron-mercury-iron coherer with telephone detector" in a paper presented at the Royal Society, London.[18]

Bose's demonstration of remote wireless signalling has priority over Marconi.[19] He was the first to use a semiconductor junction to detect radio waves, and he invented various now commonplace microwave components. In 1954, Pearson and Brattain gave priority to Bose for the use of a semi-conducting crystal as a detector of radio waves. Further work at millimetre wavelengths was almost nonexistent for nearly 50 years. In 1897, Bose described to the Royal Institution in London his research carried out in Kolkata at millimetre wavelengths. He used waveguides, horn antennas, dielectric lenses, various polarisers and even semiconductors at frequencies as high as 60 GHz; much of his original equipment is still in existence, now at the Bose Institute in Kolkata. A 1.3 mm multi-beam receiver now in use on the NRAO 12 Metre Telescope, Arizona, U.S.A. incorporates concepts from his original 1897 papers.[17]

Sir Nevill Mott, Nobel Laureate in 1977 for his own contributions to solid-state electronics, remarked that "J.C. Bose was at least 60 years ahead of his time" and "In fact, he had anticipated the existence of P-type and N-type semiconductors."

[edit] Plant research

Bose's next contribution to science was in plant physiology. He forwarded a theory for the ascent of sap in plants in 1927, his theory contributed to the vital theory of ascent of sap. According to his theory, electromechanical pulsations of living cells were responsible for the ascent of sap in plants.

He was skeptical about the then, and still now, most popular theory for the ascent of sap, the tension-cohesion theory of Dixon and Joly, first proposed in 1894. The 'CP theory', proposed by Canny in 1995,[20] validates this skepticism. Canny experimentally demonstrated pumping in the living cells in the junction of the endodermis.

In his research in plant stimuli, Bose showed with the help of his newly invented crescograph that plants responded to various stimuli as if they had nervous systems like that of animals. He therefore found a parallelism between animal and plant tissues. His experiments showed that plants grow faster in pleasant music and their growth is retarded in noise or harsh sound. This was experimentally verified later on.[citation needed]

His major contribution in the field of biophysics was the demonstration of the electrical nature of the conduction of various stimuli (e.g., wounds, chemical agents) in plants, which were earlier thought to be of a chemical nature. These claims were later proven experimentally by Wildon et al. (Nature, 1992, 360, 62–65). He was also the first to study the action of microwaves in plant tissues and corresponding changes in the cell membrane potential. He researched the mechanism of the seasonal effect on plants, the effect of chemical inhibitors on plant stimuli, the effect of temperature etc. From the analysis of the variation of the cell membrane potential of plants under different circumstances, he deduced the claim that plants can "feel pain, understand affection etc.".

[edit] Electrical response in metals

J.C. Bose was the first physicist who began an examination of inorganic matter (metals and certain rocks) in the same way as a biologist examines a muscle or a nerve. He subjected metals to various kinds of stimulus—mechanical, thermal, chemical, and electrical. He found that all sorts of stimulus produce an excitatory change in them. And this excitation sometimes expresses itself in a visible change of form and sometimes not; but the disturbance produced by the stimulus always exhibits itself in an electric response. He next subjected plants and animal tissues to various kinds of stimulus and also found that they also give an electric response. Finding that a universal reaction brought together metals, plants and animals under a common law, he next proceeded to a study of modifications in response, which occur under various conditions. He found that they are all(metals and living tissues) benumbed by cold, intoxicated by alcohol, wearied by excessive work, stupified by anaesthetics, excited by electric currents, stung by physical blows and killed by poison—they all exhibit essentially the same phenomena of fatigue and depression, together with possibilities of recovery and of exaltation, yet also that of permanent irresponsiveness which is associated with death—they all are responsive or irresponsive under the same conditions and in the same manner. The investigations showed that, in the entire range of response phenomena (inclusive as that is of metals, plants and animals) there is no breach of continuity; that “the living response in all its diverse modifications is only a repetition of responses seen in the inorganic” and that the phenomena of response “are determined, not by the play of an unknowable and arbitrary vital force, but by the working of laws that know no change, acting equally and uniformly throughout the organic and inorganic matter.”[21][22]

[edit] Science fiction

In 1896, Bose wrote Niruddesher Kahini, the first major work in Bangla science fiction. Later, he added the story in the Abyakta book as Palatak Tuphan. He was the first science fiction writer in the Bengali language.[23]

[edit] Bose and patents

The inventor of "Wireless Telecommunications", Bose was not interested in patenting his invention. In his Friday Evening Discourse at the Royal Institution, London, he made public his construction of the coherer. Thus The Electric Engineer expressed "surprise that no secret was at anytime made as to its construction, so that it has been open to all the world to adopt it for practical and possibly moneymaking purposes."[7] Bose declined an offer from a wireless apparatus manufacturer for signing a remunerative agreement. It might be interesting to note here that although Sir J. C. Bose did not see the merit of patenting, Swami Vivekananda disagreed. However, prior to his trip to USA, Swami Vivekananda visited Prof. J. C. Bose and tried to convince him to patent this invention of his. Since he knew that it wouldl be futile to try convince him do such an act, he instead made copies of this ground breaking and carried it with him to USA. Besides, delivering his world famous talk at the conference on World Religions, Swami Vivekananda asked one of his disciples, Sara Chapman Bull, to file a patent application for "detector for electrical disturbances" in the absence of Sir J. C. Bose. The application was filed on 30 September 1901 and it was granted as US 755840on 29 March 1904. This act of Swami Vivekananda has finally garnered an Indian scientist with the recognition for being one of the founding fathers of wireless communication. Prof. J. C. Bose never visited USA.

Speaking in New Delhi in August 2006, at a seminar titled Owning the Future: Ideas and Their Role in the Digital Age, Dr. V S Ramamurthy, the Chairman of the Board of Governors of IIT Delhi, stressed the attitude of Bose towards patents:

"His reluctance to any form of patenting is well known. It was contained in his letter to (Indian Nobel laureate) Rabindranath Tagore dated 17 May 1901 from London. It was not that Sir Jagadish was unaware of patents and its advantages. He was the first Indian to get a US Patent (No: 755840) in 1904. And Sir Jagadish was not alone in his avowed reluctance to patenting. Roentgen, Pierre Curie and others also chose the path of no patenting on moral grounds." However, it is necessary to mention that Roentgen is not the original inventor of X-rays. It was Nikolai Tesla's invention. Tesla had patented this technology prior to Roentgen inventing it. Roentgen had eventually met Tesla and had long conversations with him regarding Tesla's inventions, and might have realized that he could never patent his invention as it was prior art at that point.

Bose also recorded his attitude towards patents in his inaugural lecture at the foundation of the Bose Institute on 30 November 1917

A. P. J. Abdul KalamFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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This article is about the former President of India. For the freedom fighter, see Abul Kalam Azad.

Abul Phaqir Jain-ul-Abideen Abdul Kalamஅவுல் பகீர் ஜை�னுலா�ப்தீன் அப்துல்

கலா�ம்

Abdul Kalam at the 12th Wharton India Economic Forum,

2008.

President of India

In office

25 July 2002 – 24 July 2007

Prime MinisterAtal Bihari Vajpayee

Manmohan Singh

Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat

Preceded by Kocheril Raman Narayanan

Succeeded by Mrs.Pratibha DeviSingh Patil

Personal details

Born 15 October 1931 (age 79)

Rameswaram, British India (now Tamil

Nadu, India)

Political party Independent

Alma materSt. Joseph's College, Tiruchirappalli

Madras Institute of Technology

Profession Aerospace engineer

Religion Islam

Abul Phaqir Jain-ul-Abideen Abdul Kalam pronunciation (help·info) (Tamil: அவுல் பகீர் ஜை�னுலா�ப்தீன் அப்துல் கலா�ம்; born 15 October 1931) usually referred to as A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, is an Aerospace engineer, professor, and chancellor of the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST), who served as the 11th President of India from 2002 to 2007.[1] During his term as President, he was popularly known as the People's President.[2][3] He was awarded the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honour.

Before his term as India's president, he worked as an aeronautical engineer with DRDO and ISRO. He is popularly known as the Missile Man of India for his work on development of ballistic missile and space rocket technology.[4] Kalam played a pivotal organizational, technical and political role in India's Pokhran-II nuclear test in 1998, the first since the original nuclear test by India in 1974.[5]

He is currently the chancellor of Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology, a professor at Anna University (Chennai), a visiting professor at Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Indian Institute of Management Indore, and an adjunct/visiting faculty at many other academic and research institutions across India.

In May 2011, Dr. Kalam launched his mission for the youth of the nation called the What Can I Give Movement.[6] Dr. Kalam better known as a scientist, also has special interest in the field of arts like writing Tamil poems, and also playing the music instrument Veena.[7]

Contents

[hide]

1 Early life and education 2 Career 3 Issues held

o 3.1 Future India: 2020 4 Awards and honours

5 Books and documentaries 6 Quotations 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Early life and education

Abdul Kalam was born in Rameshwaram, presently Tamil Nadu, in India in 1931. He spent most of his childhood in financial problems and started working at an early age to supplement his family's income.

After completing his school education, Kalam graduated in physics from St. Joseph's College, Tiruchirapalli. He then graduated with a diploma in Aeronautical Engineering in the mid-1950s from the Madras Institute of Technology.[8] As the Project Director, he was heavily involved in the development of India's first indigenous Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-II).

[edit] Career

Kalam joined the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) in 1958 and served as a senior scientific assistant, heading a small team that developed a prototype hovercraft. Defence Minister V. K. Krishna Menon rode in India's first indigenous hovercraft with Kalam at the controls. Kalam left the DRDO in 1962 and joined the Indian space programme.

At the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), Kalam initiated Fibre-reinforced plastic (FRP) activities; after a stint with the aerodynamics and design group, he joined the satellite launch vehicle team at Thumba, near Thiruvananthapuram, and soon became Project Director for Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-3). The SLV-3 project culminated in putting the scientific satellite Rohini into orbit in July 1980. He was honoured with a Padma Bhushan in 1981.

File:Abdul Kalam.jpg

Dr A. P. J Abdul Kalam

Kalam then moved back into the Defence Research Complex at Kanchanbagh, as Director of Defense Research & Development Laboratory (DRDL). He refused to move into the bungalow allotted to the Director, preferring to stay in one of the eight suites in the Defence Labs Mess. The suite, with a small study and a tiny bedroom, was his home for the next decade.

Kalam was instrumental in the re-emergence of the DRDL. This was made possible, as Kalam and the then Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister, Dr.V. S. Arunachalam (who brought him back to defence research), have always acknowledged, by the crucial role played by R. Venkataraman, who was Defence Minister. Kalam was asked to prepare a blueprint to make India a missile nation. After working with DRDL veterans for over six months, followed by consultations with Arunachalam, Kalam gave a proposal to Venkataraman. He provided a 5 missile development plan that was to be taken up one after the other. The defense minister

suggested that Kalam and Arunachalam recast the plan in such a way as to develop all five missile types under one programmme. The time frame for these programmes was 10 years.

Out of these initiatives was born the guided missile programme, India's most successful military research task to date. Kalam's codenames for the Integrated Guided Missile Development Program (I.G.M.D.P) five components were: Prithvi, a surface-to-surface battlefield missile; Nag Missile, an anti-tank missile (ATM); Akash missile, a swift, medium-range surface-to-air missile (SAM); Trishul missile, a quick-reaction SAM with a shorter range,Astra an air to air missile and Agni, an intermediate range ballistic missile, the mightiest of them all. Trishul missile has the unique distinction of being capable of serving all three services.

In the new management structure of the Missile Programme, Kalam, as the Chairman of the Programme Management Board, delegated almost all executive and financial powers to five carefully selected Project Directors and kept himself free to address the core technology issues. The missiles went up more or less on schedule: Trishul missile in 1985, Prithvi in 1988, Agni in 1989 and the others in 1990.

Kalam was awarded the Padma Vibhushan in 1990. After 10 years in DRDL, he went to Delhi to take over from Arunachalam as Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister from July 1992 to December 1999. In Delhi, Kalam as head of the DRDO had to oversee other prestigious projects, such as the Main Battle Tank (MBT) Arjun and the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) projects.

Pokhran-II nuclear tests were conducted during this period and have been associated with Kalam although he was not directly involved with the nuclear program at the time.

Prasanta Chandra MahalanobisFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis

P.C. Mahalanobis

Born29 June 1893Calcutta, India

Died28 June 1972 (aged 78)Calcutta, India

Residence India, United Kingdom, United States

Nationality India

Fields Mathematics, Statistics

InstitutionsUniversity of CambridgeIndian Statistical Institute

Alma materUniversity of CalcuttaUniversity of Cambridge

Doctoral advisor Ronald Fisher

Known for Mahalanobis distance

Notable awards Weldon Memorial Prize (1944)

Padma Vibhushan (1968)

Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis, FRS (Bengali: প্রশ�ন্ত চন্দ্র মহলা�নবিবসু) (29 June 1893 – 28 June 1972) was an Indian scientist and applied statistician. He is best remembered for the Mahalanobis distance, a statistical measure. He made pioneering studies in anthropometry in India. He founded the Indian Statistical Institute, and contributed to the design of large scale sample surveys.[1][2]

Contents

[hide]

1 Early life 2 The Indian Statistical Institute 3 Contributions to statistics

o 3.1 Mahalanobis distance o 3.2 Sample surveys

4 Later life 5 Honours 6 Notes 7 External links

[edit] Early life

Mahalanobis belonged to a family of Bengali landed gentry who lived in Bikrampur (now in Bangladesh). His grandfather Gurucharan (1833-1916) moved to Calcutta in 1854 and built up a business, starting a chemist shop in 1860. Gurucharan was influenced by Debendranath Tagore (1817-1905), father of the Nobel poet, Rabindranath Tagore. Gurucharan was actively involved in social movements such as the Brahmo Samaj, acting as its Treasurer and President. His house on 210 Cornwallis Street was the center of the Brahmo Samaj. Gurucharan married a widow against social traditions. His elder son Subodhchandra (1867-1954) was the father of P. C. Mahalanobis. He was a distinguished educationist who studied physiology at Edinburgh University and later became a Professor at the Presidency College became head of the department of Physiology. Subodhchandra also became a member of the Senate of the Calcutta University. Born in the house at 210 Cornwallis Street, P. C. Mahalanobis, grew up in a socially active family surrounded by intellectuals and reformers.[1]

Mahalanobis received his early schooling at the Brahmo Boys School in Calcutta graduating in 1908. He then joined the Presidency College, Calcutta and received a B.Sc. degree with honours in physics in 1912. He left for England in 1913 to join Cambridge. He however missed a train and stayed with a friend at King's College, Cambridge. He was impressed by the Chapel there and his host's friend M. A. Candeth suggested that he could try joining there, which he did. He did well in his studies, but also took an interest in cross-country walking and punting on the

river. He interacted with the mathematical genius Srinivasa Ramanujan during the latter's time at Cambridge. After his Tripos in physics, Mahalanobis worked with C. T. R. Wilson at the Cavendish Laboratory. He took a short break and went to India and here he was introduced to the Principal of Presidency College and was invited to take classes in physics.[1]

He went back to England and was introduced to the journal Biometrika. This interested him so much that he bought a complete set and took them to India. He discovered the utility of statistics to problems in meteorology, anthropology and began working on it on his journey back to India.[1]

In Calcutta, Mahalanobis met Nirmalkumari, daughter of Herambhachandra Maitra, a leading educationist and member of the Brahmo Samaj. They married on 27 February 1923 although her father did not completely approve of it. The contention was partly due to Mahalanobis' opposition of various clauses in the membership of the student wing of the Brahmo Samaj, including restraining members from drinking and smoking. Sir Nilratan Sircar, P. C. Mahalanobis' uncle took part in the wedding ceremony in place of the father of the bride.[1]

[edit] The Indian Statistical Institute

Main article: Indian Statistical Institute

Mahalanobis memorial at ISI Delhi

Many colleagues of Mahalanobis took an interest in statistics and the group grew in the Statistical Laboratory located in his room at the Presidency College, Calcutta. A meeting was called on the 17 December 1931 with Pramatha Nath Banerji (Minto Professor of Economics), Nikhil Ranjan Sen (Khaira Professor of Applied Mathematics) and Sir R. N. Mukherji. The meeting led to the establishment of the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), and formally registered on 28 April 1932 as a non-profit distributing learned society under the Societies Registration Act XXI of 1860.[1]

The Institute was initially in the Physics Department of the Presidency College and the expenditure in the first year was Rs. 238. It gradually grew with the pioneering work of a group of his colleagues including S. S. Bose, J. M. Sengupta, R. C. Bose, S. N. Roy, K. R. Nair, R. R. Bahadur, G. Kallianpur, D. B. Lahiri and C. R. Rao. The institute also gained major assistance

through Pitamber Pant, who was a secretary to the Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Pant was trained in statistics at the Institute and took a keen interest in the institute.[1]

In 1933, the journal Sankhya was founded along the lines of Karl Pearson's Biometrika.[1]

The Institute started a training section in 1938. Many of the early workers left the ISI for careers in the USA and with the government of India. Mahalanobis invited J. B. S. Haldane to join him at the ISI and Haldane joined as a Research Professor from August 1957 and stayed on until February 1961. He resigned from ISI due to frustrations with the administration and disagreements with Mahalanobis' administrative policies. He was also very concerned with the frequent travels and absence of the director and wrote The journeyings of our Director define a novel random vector. Haldane however helped the ISI grow in biometrics.[3]

In 1959 the Institute was declared as an Institute of national importance and a deemed university.[1]

[edit] Contributions to statistics

[edit] Mahalanobis distance

Main article: Mahalanobis distance

A chance meeting with Nelson Annandale, then the director of the Zoological Survey of India, at the 1920 Nagpur session of the Indian Science Congress led to a problem in anthropology. Annandale asked him to analyse anthropometric measurements of Anglo-Indians in Calcutta and this led to his first scientific paper in 1922. During the course of these studies he found a way of comparing and grouping populations using a multivariate distance measure. This measure, D2, which is now named after him as Mahalanobis distance, is independent of measurement scale.[1]

Inspired by Biometrika and mentored by Acharya Brajendra Nath Seal he started his statistical work. Initially he worked on analyzing university exam results, anthropometric measurements on Anglo-Indians of Calcutta and some meteorological problems. He also worked as a meteorologist for some time. In 1924, when he was working on the probable error of results of agricultural experiments, he met Ronald Fisher, with whom he established a life-long friendship. He also worked on schemes to prevent floods.

[edit] Sample surveys

His most important contributions are related to large scale sample surveys. He introduced the concept of pilot surveys and advocated the usefulness of sampling methods. Early surveys began between 1937 to 1944 and included topics such as consumer expenditure, tea-drinking habits, public opinion, crop acreage and plant disease. Harold Hotelling wrote: "No technique of random sample has, so far as I can find, been developed in the United States or elsewhere, which can compare in accuracy with that described by Professor Mahalanobis" and Sir R. A. Fisher commented that "The I.S.I. has taken the lead in the original development of the technique of sample surveys, the most potent fact finding process available to the administration".[1]

He introduced a method for estimating crop yields which involved statisticians sampling in the fields by cutting crops in a circle of diameter 4 feet. Others such as P. V. Sukhatme and V. G. Panse who began to work on crop surveys with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute suggested that a survey system should make use of the existing administrative framework. The differences in opinion led to acrimony and there was little interaction between Mahalanobis and agricultural research in later years

Mani Lal BhaumikFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Mani Bhaumik

Born Medinipore, West Bengal, India

Residence United States

Citizenship United States

Fields Physicist

InstitutionsUniversity of California, Los Angeles, California State University, Long Beach

Alma materScottish Church CollegeUniversity of CalcuttaIIT Kharagpur

Doctoral advisorSatyendra Nath BosePaul Dirac

Known for LASIK

Mani Lal Bhaumik is an Indian-born American physicist. He has been an author, lecturer, entrepreneur, and philanthropist.

His early contributions to laser technology are exemplified by the development of the excimer laser at the Northrop Corporation Research and Technology Center in Los Angeles. As team leader, Dr. Bhaumik announced the successful demonstration of the world's first efficient excimer laser at the Denver, Colorado meeting of the Optical Society of America in May 1973. Subsequently, it found extensive use as the type of laser that made possible the immensely popular Lasik corrective eye surgery, eliminating the need for glasses or contact lenses in many cases. In recognition of his pioneering research in high energy lasers and new laser systems, Dr. Bhaumik has been elected by his peers to fellowships in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers as well as of the American Physical Society.

Dr. Bhaumik's current interest is in sharing with the public the advances in quantum physics and cosmology and their implications for both material and spiritual development.

He was given one of India's prestigious civilian award - Padma Shri - in 2011.

Contents

[hide]

1 Biography 2 Professional career 3 Books, media, and philanthropic activities 4 Code Name: God 5 Honors and awards 6 Selected appearances on radio and television 7 Philanthropic endeavors 8 Notes 9 References 10 External links

[edit] Biography

Bhaumik was born in a small village in Tamluk, Medinipore, West Bengal India, and thrust into the vortex of the struggle for Indian independence. Education provided him a way out of poverty. He walked four miles barefoot to the nearest school, and endured famine, flood, and armed threat. As an impressionable teenager, He received a Bachelor of Science degree from Scottish Church College and an M. Sc. from the University of Calcutta. He won the attention of Satyendra Nath Bose (co-creator of the Bose-Einstein Statistics) who encouraged his prodigious curiosity. Bhaumik earned a Ph.D in Physics from the IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) at Kharagpur. His thesis was on Resonant Electronic Energy Transfers, a subject he would have cause to use in his work with lasers.

[edit] Professional career

Receiving a Sloan Foundation Fellowship in 1959, Dr. Bhaumik came to the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) for post doctoral studies. In 1961, he joined the Quantum Electronics Division at Xerox Electro-Optical Systems in Pasadena and began his career as a laser scientist. Concurrently, he taught Quantum physics and Astronomy at the California State University at Long Beach. In 1968, he was enlisted by the Northrop Corporate Research Laboratory, where he rose to become the director of the Laser Technology Laboratory and led the team responsible for the development of the excimer laser technology. Dr. Bhaumik announced the successful demonstration of the world's first efficient excimer laser at the Denver, Colorado meeting of the Optical Society of America in May 1973. The application of this class of laser in the patented Lasik eye surgery would eventually eliminate the need for glasses or contact lenses in many cases.

In recognition of his pioneering research in high energy lasers and new laser systems, he was elected by his peers as a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers as well as of the American Physical Society.

Dr. Bhaumik's current interest is in sharing with the public the astounding advances in quantum physics and cosmology and their implications for our lives, work, technology, and spiritual development. This he endeavors to do through books such as the internationally published Code Name God and The Cosmic Detective, articles, lectures, and TV programs like the award-winning Cosmic Quantum Ray. He is also keenly interested in research on the origin and the nature of consciousness and how that knowledge can be utilised in improving the quality of our existence. [1]

Dr. Bhaumik has published over fifty papers in various professional journals and is a holder of a dozen laser-related U.S. patents. His latest paper, Unified Field—the Universal Blueprint? appeared in the February 2000 issue of the International Journal of Mathematics and Mathematical Sciences. He has been invited to lecture all over the world, at forums including: Summer School on High-Power Gas Lasers, Capri, Italy 1975; International Symposium on Gas-Flow and Chemical Lasers, Belgium 1978; International Symposium on Gas Discharge Lasers, Grenoble, France 1979; Asoke Sarkar Memorial Lecture, Calcutta International Book Fair 2001; Institute of Culture, Calcutta, India 2006.

He is the official patron of the International Year of Astronomy (IYA).www.Astronomy2009.org

[edit] Books, media, and philanthropic activities

Dr. Bhaumik utilized the earnings from his scientific career to seed various investments and was able to leave the poverty of his childhood behind. His life was chronicled on Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. Later he discovered that spirituality is an essential ingredient for an abiding happiness and turned to the study of the relationship between advanced science and spirituality.

His intensive search spanned a decade, produced a number of significant papers, and led him to the inference that the One Source at the hub of all spiritual traditions is grounded in scientific reality and not a mere creation of blind faith. He also argues forcefully that contrary to the popular misconception, science and spirituality are indeed two sides of the same coin, the coin

being that unique human consciousness that allows us to perceive both ourselves and objective reality. Therefore, he argues in his book Code Name God (Crossroads Publishing), the big divide between science and spirituality can be bridged. The trick, Bhaumik asserts, is to see things in an entirely new light–a light shed upon by the recent revelations of quantum physics and cosmology. He now devotes much of his time and energy to bringing this message to the public, including its younger members, for whom he has recently published The Cosmic Detective (Penguin 2008), a primer on cosmology, and created an award winning animated television series, Quantum Ray, shown on the HUB channel, reaching 60 million homes in USA and distributed worldwide.

Dr. Bhaumik has instituted an annual International Award through the UCLA Neuropsychiatry Institute to acknowledge the best scientific evidence demonstrating the effect of mind in healing. He has been involved in numerous community activities through his association with the Los Angeles Bombay Sister City Association; the Los Angeles St. Petersburg Sister City association; the Long Beach Calcutta sister City Association and others. He has donated to various charitable organizations including the Thalians of Los Angeles. But he is perhaps best known and revered internationally for his creation of the Bhaumik Educational Foundation, based in Calcutta, which provides full scholarships to needy but brilliant students who wish to apply themselves to studies in science and technology.[2] [3]

[edit] Code Name: God

First published in the U.S. in 2005, Code Name God (Crossroads Publishing ISBN 10-0824525191), Code Name: God is a distillation of Dr. Bhaumik's central thesis that the discoveries of modern physics can be reconciled with the great truths of the world religions when those truths are viewed as elements of what Aldous Huxley called "The Perennial Philosophy." In particular, Dr. Bhaumik finds strong support in advanced physics and cosmology for the Neo-Platonic notion of "the One" (identified here as "The One Source"), and conjectures that this existential source may reside in what is known as the quantum vacuum state and be in some manner co-eternal and co-equal with human consciousness. The book and its premise have been praised by luminaries of both the literary and scientific words, including Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who wrote, "This example of a personal spiritual growth...and re-evaluation of material values...arouses very warm feelings. God is one and there are no major differences between religions." Fritjof Capra, author of The Tao of Physics, wrote "...the attempt to find common ground between Eastern spirituality and Western science is eloquently told and makes for fascinating reading." it's seen that most of his arguments are led by his belief and his over fascination on spirituality, thus his books are creating a lot of controversy

BrahmaguptaFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Brahmagupta (Sanskrit: ब्रह्मगु�प्त; ( listen (help·info)) (598–668 CE) was an Indian mathematician and astronomer who wrote many important works on mathematics and astronomy. His best known work is the Brāhmasphuṭasiddhānta (Correctly Established Doctrine of Brahma), written in 628 in Bhinmal. Its 25 chapters contain several unprecedented mathematical results.

Contents

[hide]

1 Life and work 2 Mathematics

o 2.1 Algebra o 2.2 Arithmetic

2.2.1 Series 2.2.2 Zero

o 2.3 Diophantine analysis 2.3.1 Pythagorean triples 2.3.2 Pell's equation

o 2.4 Geometry 2.4.1 Brahmagupta's formula 2.4.2 Triangles 2.4.3 Brahmagupta's theorem 2.4.4 Pi 2.4.5 Measurements and constructions

o 2.5 Trigonometry 2.5.1 Sine table 2.5.2 Interpolation formula

3 Astronomy 4 Citations and footnotes 5 See also 6 References 7 External links

Life and work

Brahmagupta is believed to have been born in 598 AD in Bhinmal city in the state of Rajasthan of Northwest India. In ancient times Bhillamala was the seat of power of the Gurjars. His father was Jisnugupta.[1] He likely lived most of his life in Bhillamala (modern Bhinmal in Rajasthan) during the reign (and possibly under the patronage) of King Vyaghramukha.[2] As a result, Brahmagupta is often referred to as Bhillamalacarya, that is, the teacher from Bhillamala. He was the head of the astronomical observatory at Ujjain, and during his tenure there wrote four texts on mathematics and astronomy: the Cadamekela in 624, the Brahmasphutasiddhanta in 628, the Khandakhadyaka in 665, and the Durkeamynarda in 672. The Brahmasphutasiddhanta (Corrected Treatise of Brahma) is arguably his most famous work. The historian al-Biruni (c. 1050) in his book Tariq al-Hind states that the Abbasid caliph al-Ma'mun had an embassy in India and from India a book was brought to Baghdad which was translated into Arabic as Sindhind. It is generally presumed that Sindhind is none other than Brahmagupta's Brahmasphuta-siddhanta.[3]

Although Brahmagupta was familiar with the works of astronomers following the tradition of Aryabhatiya, it is not known if he was familiar with the work of Bhaskara I, a contemporary.[2] Brahmagupta had a plethora of criticism directed towards the work of rival astronomers, and in

his Brahmasphutasiddhanta is found one of the earliest attested schisms among Indian mathematicians. The division was primarily about the application of mathematics to the physical world, rather than about the mathematics itself. In Brahmagupta's case, the disagreements stemmed largely from the choice of astronomical parameters and theories.[2] Critiques of rival theories appear throughout the first ten astronomical chapters and the eleventh chapter is entirely devoted to criticism of these theories, although no criticisms appear in the twelfth and eighteenth chapters.[2]

Mathematics

Brahmagupta was the first to use zero as a number. He gave rules to compute with zero. Negative numbers did not appear in Brahmasputa siddhanta but in the Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art (Jiu zhang suan-shu) around 200 BC. Brahmagupta's most famous work is his Brahmasphutasiddhanta. It is composed in elliptic verse, as was common practice in Indian mathematics, and consequently has a poetic ring to it. As no proofs are given, it is not known how Brahmagupta's mathematics was derived.[4]

Algebra

Brahmagupta gave the solution of the general linear equation in chapter eighteen of Brahmasphutasiddhanta,

The difference between rupas, when inverted and divided by the difference of the unknowns, is the unknown in the equation. The rupas are [subtracted on the side] below that from which the square and the unknown are to be subtracted.[5]

Which is a solution equivalent to , where rupas represents constants. He further gave two equivalent solutions to the general quadratic equation,

18.44. Diminish by the middle [number] the square-root of the rupas multiplied by four times the square and increased by the square of the middle [number]; divide the remainder by twice the square. [The result is] the middle [number].18.45. Whatever is the square-root of the rupas multiplied by the square [and] increased by the square of half the unknown, diminish that by half the unknown [and] divide [the remainder] by its square. [The result is] the unknown.[5]

Which are, respectively, solutions equivalent to,

and

He went on to solve systems of simultaneous indeterminate equations stating that the desired variable must first be isolated, and then the equation must be divided by the desired variable's coefficient. In particular, he recommended using "the pulverizer" to solve equations with multiple unknowns.

18.51. Subtract the colors different from the first color. [The remainder] divided by the first [color's coefficient] is the measure of the first. [Terms] two by two [are] considered [when reduced to] similar divisors, [and so on] repeatedly. If there are many [colors], the pulverizer [is to be used].[5]

Like the algebra of Diophantus, the algebra of Brahmagupta was syncopated. Addition was indicated by placing the numbers side by side, subtraction by placing a dot over the subtrahend, and division by placing the divisor below the dividend, similar to our notation but without the bar. Multiplication, evolution, and unknown quantities were represented by abbreviations of appropriate terms.[6] The extent of Greek influence on this syncopation, if any, is not known and it is possible that both Greek and Indian syncopation may be derived from a common Babylonian source.[6]

Arithmetic

Many cultures knew four fundamental operations. The way we do now based on Hindu Arabic number system first appeared in Brahmasputa siddhanta. Contrary to popular opinion, the four fundamental operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication and division) did not appear first in BrahmasputhaSiddhanta, but they were already known by the Sumerians at least 2500 BC. In BrahmasputhaSiddhanta, Multiplication was named Gomutrika. In the beginning of chapter twelve of his Brahmasphutasiddhanta, entitled Calculation, Brahmagupta details operations on fractions. The reader is expected to know the basic arithmetic operations as far as taking the square root, although he explains how to find the cube and cube-root of an integer and later gives rules facilitating the computation of squares and square roots. He then gives rules for dealing with five

types of combinations of fractions, , , , , and

.[7]

Series

Brahmagupta then goes on to give the sum of the squares and cubes of the first n integers.

12.20. The sum of the squares is that [sum] multiplied by twice the [number of] step[s] increased by one [and] divided by three. The sum of the cubes is the square of that [sum] Piles of these with identical balls [can also be computed].[8]

It is important to note here Brahmagupta found the result in terms of the sum of the first n integers, rather than in terms of n as is the modern practice.[9]

He gives the sum of the squares of the first n natural numbers as n(n+1)(2n+1)/6 and the sum of the cubes of the first n natural numbers as (n(n+1)/2)².

Zero

Brahmagupta's Brahmasphuṭasiddhanta is the very first book that mentions zero as a number, hence Brahmagupta is considered as the man who found zero. He gave rules of using zero with other numbers. Zero plus a positive number is the positive number etc. The Brahmasphutasiddhanta is the earliest known text to treat zero as a number in its own right, rather than as simply a placeholder digit in representing another number as was done by the Babylonians or as a symbol for a lack of quantity as was done by Ptolemy and the Romans. In chapter eighteen of his Brahmasphutasiddhanta, Brahmagupta describes operations on negative numbers. He first describes addition and subtraction,

18.30. [The sum] of two positives is positives, of two negatives negative; of a positive and a negative [the sum] is their difference; if they are equal it is zero. The sum of a negative and zero is negative, [that] of a positive and zero positive, [and that] of two zeros zero.[...]18.32. A negative minus zero is negative, a positive [minus zero] positive; zero [minus zero] is zero. When a positive is to be subtracted from a negative or a negative from a positive, then it is to be added.[5]

He goes on to describe multiplication,

18.33. The product of a negative and a positive is negative, of two negatives positive, and of positives positive; the product of zero and a negative, of zero and a positive, or of two zeros is zero.[5]

But his description of division by zero differs from our modern understanding,

18.34. A positive divided by a positive or a negative divided by a negative is positive; a zero divided by a zero is zero; a positive divided by a negative is negative; a negative divided by a positive is [also] negative.18.35. A negative or a positive divided by zero has that [zero] as its divisor, or zero divided by a negative or a positive [has that negative or positive as its divisor]. The square of a negative or of a positive is positive; [the square] of zero is zero. That of which [the square] is the square is [its] square-root.[5]

Here Brahmagupta states that and as for the question of where he did not commit himself.[10] His rules for arithmetic on negative numbers and zero are quite close

to the modern understanding, except that in modern mathematics division by zero is left undefined.

Diophantine analysis

Pythagorean triples

In chapter twelve of his Brahmasphutasiddhanta, Brahmagupta finds Pythagorean triples,

12.39. The height of a mountain multiplied by a given multiplier is the distance to a city; it is not erased. When it is divided by the multiplier increased by two it is the leap of one of the two who make the same journey.[8]

or in other words, for a given length m and an arbitrary multiplier x, let a = mx and b = m + mx/(x + 2). Then m, a, and b form a Pythagorean triple.[8]

Pell's equation

Brahmagupta went on to give a recurrence relation for generating solutions to certain instances of Diophantine equations of the second degree such as Nx2 + 1 = y2 (called Pell's equation) by using the Euclidean algorithm. The Euclidean algorithm was known to him as the "pulverizer" since it breaks numbers down into ever smaller pieces.[11]

The nature of squares:18.64. [Put down] twice the square-root of a given square by a multiplier and increased or diminished by an arbitrary [number]. The product of the first [pair], multiplied by the multiplier, with the product of the last [pair], is the last computed.18.65. The sum of the thunderbolt products is the first. The additive is equal to the product of the additives. The two square-roots, divided by the additive or the subtractive, are the additive rupas.[5]

The key to his solution was the identity,[12]

which is a generalization of an identity that was discovered by Diophantus,

Using his identity and the fact that if (x1, y1) and (x2, y2) are solutions to the equations x2 − Ny2 = k1 and x2 − Ny2 = k2, respectively, then (x1x2 + Ny1y2, x1y2 + x2y1) is a solution to x2 − Ny2 = k1k2, he was able to find integral solutions to the Pell's equation through a series of equations of the form x2 − Ny2 = ki. Unfortunately, Brahmagupta was not able to apply his solution uniformly for all possible values of N, rather he was only able to show that if x2 − Ny2 = k has an

integral solution for k = ±1, ±2, or ±4, then x2 − Ny2 = 1 has a solution. The solution of the general Pell's equation would have to wait for Bhaskara II in c. 1150 CE.[12]

Geometry

Brahmagupta's formula

Diagram for reference

Main article: Brahmagupta's formula

Brahmagupta's most famous result in geometry is his formula for cyclic quadrilaterals. Given the lengths of the sides of any cyclic quadrilateral, Brahmagupta gave an approximate and an exact formula for the figure's area,

12.21. The approximate area is the product of the halves of the sums of the sides and opposite sides of a triangle and a quadrilateral. The accurate [area] is the square root from the product of the halves of the sums of the sides diminished by [each] side of the quadrilateral.[8]

So given the lengths p, q, r and s of a cyclic quadrilateral, the approximate area

is while, letting , the exact area is

Although Brahmagupta does not explicitly state that these quadrilaterals are cyclic, it is apparent from his rules that this is the case.[13] Heron's formula is a special case of this formula and it can be derived by setting one of the sides equal to zero.

Triangles

Brahmagupta dedicated a substantial portion of his work to geometry. One theorem states that the two lengths of a triangle's base when divided by its altitude then follows,

12.22. The base decreased and increased by the difference between the squares of the sides divided by the base; when divided by two they are the true segments. The perpendicular [altitude] is the square-root from the square of a side diminished by the square of its segment.[8]

Thus the lengths of the two segments are .

He further gives a theorem on rational triangles. A triangle with rational sides a, b, c and rational area is of the form:

for some rational numbers u, v, and w.[14]

Brahmagupta's theoremMain article: Brahmagupta theorem

Brahmagupta's theorem states that AF = FD.

Brahmagupta continues,

12.23. The square-root of the sum of the two products of the sides and opposite sides of a non-unequal quadrilateral is the diagonal. The square

of the diagonal is diminished by the square of half the sum of the base and the top; the square-root is the perpendicular [altitudes].[8]

So, in a "non-unequal" cyclic quadrilateral (that is, an isosceles

trapezoid), the length of each diagonal is .

He continues to give formulas for the lengths and areas of geometric figures, such as the circumradius of an isosceles trapezoid and a scalene quadrilateral, and the lengths of diagonals in a scalene cyclic quadrilateral. This leads up to Brahmagupta's famous theorem,

12.30-31. Imaging two triangles within [a cyclic quadrilateral] with unequal sides, the two diagonals are the two bases. Their two segments are separately the upper and lower segments [formed] at the intersection of the diagonals. The two [lower segments] of the two diagonals are two sides in a triangle; the base [of the quadrilateral is the base of the triangle]. Its perpendicular is the lower portion of the [central] perpendicular; the upper portion of the [central] perpendicular is half of the sum of the [sides] perpendiculars diminished by the lower [portion of the central perpendicular].[8]

Pi

In verse 40, he gives values of π,

12.40. The diameter and the square of the radius [each] multiplied by 3 are [respectively] the practical circumference and the area [of a circle]. The accurate [values] are the square-roots from the squares of those two multiplied by ten.[8]

So Brahmagupta uses 3 as a "practical" value of π, and as an "accurate" value of π.

Measurements and constructions

In some of the verses before verse 40, Brahmagupta gives constructions of various figures with arbitrary sides. He essentially manipulated right triangles to produce isosceles triangles, scalene triangles, rectangles, isosceles trapezoids, isosceles trapezoids with three equal sides, and a scalene cyclic quadrilateral.

After giving the value of pi, he deals with the geometry of plane figures and solids, such as finding volumes and surface areas (or empty spaces dug out of solids). He finds the volume of rectangular prisms, pyramids, and the frustum of a square pyramid. He further finds the average depth of a series of pits. For the volume of a frustum of a pyramid, he gives the

"pragmatic" value as the depth times the square of the mean of the edges of the top and bottom faces, and he gives the "superficial" volume as the depth times their mean area.[15]

Trigonometry

Sine table

In Chapter 2 of his Brahmasphutasiddhanta, entitled Planetary True Longitudes, Brahmagupta presents a sine table:

2.2-5. The sines: The Progenitors, twins; Ursa Major, twins, the Vedas; the gods, fires, six; flavors, dice, the gods; the moon, five, the sky, the moon; the moon, arrows, suns [...][16]

Here Brahmagupta uses names of objects to represent the digits of place-value numerals, as was common with numerical data in Sanskrit treatises. Progenitors represents the 14 Progenitors ("Manu") in Indian cosmology or 14, "twins" means 2, "Ursa Major" represents the seven stars of Ursa Major or 7, "Vedas" refers to the 4 Vedas or 4, dice represents the number of sides of the tradition die or 6, and so on. This information can be translated into the list of sines, 214, 427, 638, 846, 1051, 1251, 1446, 1635, 1817, 1991, 2156, 2312, 1459, 2594, 2719, 2832, 2933, 3021, 3096, 3159, 3207, 3242, 3263, and 3270, with the radius being 3270.[17]

Interpolation formula

In 665 Brahmagupta devised and used a special case of the Newton–Stirling interpolation formula of the second-order to interpolate new values of the sine function from other values already tabulated.[18] The formula gives an estimate for the value of a function f at a value a + xh of its argument (with h > 0 and −1 ≤ x ≤ 1) when its value is already known at a − h, a and a + h.

The formula for the estimate is:

where Δ is the first-order forward-difference operator, i.e.

Astronomy

It was through the Brahmasphutasiddhanta that the Arabs learned of Indian astronomy.[19] The famous Abbasid caliph Al-Mansur (712–775) founded Baghdad, which is situated on the banks of the Tigris, and made it a center of learning. The caliph invited a scholar of Ujjain by the name of Kankah in 770 A.D. Kankah used the Brahmasphutasiddhanta to explain the Hindu system of arithmetic astronomy. Muhammad al-Fazari translated Brahmugupta's work into Arabic upon the request of the caliph.

In chapter seven of his Brahmasphutasiddhanta, entitled Lunar Crescent, Brahmagupta rebuts the idea that the Moon is farther from the Earth than the Sun, an idea which is maintained in scriptures. He does this by explaining the illumination of the Moon by the Sun.[20]

7.1. If the moon were above the sun, how would the power of waxing and waning, etc., be produced from calculation of the [longitude of the] moon? the near half [would be] always bright.7.2. In the same way that the half seen by the sun of a pot standing in sunlight is bright, and the unseen half dark, so is [the illumination] of the moon [if it is] beneath the sun.7.3. The brightness is increased in the direction of the sun. At the end of a bright [i.e. waxing] half-month, the near half is bright and the far half dark. Hence, the elevation of the horns [of the crescent can be derived] from calculation. [...][21]

He explains that since the Moon is closer to the Earth than the Sun, the degree of the illuminated part of the Moon depends on the relative positions of the Sun and the Moon, and this can be computed from the size of the angle between the two bodies.[20]

Some of the important contributions made by Brahmagupta in astronomy are: methods for calculating the position of heavenly bodies over time (ephemerides), their rising and setting, conjunctions, and the calculation of solar and lunar eclipses.[22] Brahmagupta criticized the Puranic view that the Earth was flat or hollow. Instead, he observed that the Earth and heaven were spherical and that the Earth is moving. In 1030, the Muslim astronomer Abu al-Rayhan al-Biruni, in his Ta'rikh al-Hind, later translated into Latin as Indica, commented on Brahmagupta's work and wrote that critics argued:

"If such were the case, stones would and trees would fall from the earth."[23]

According to al-Biruni, Brahmagupta responded to these criticisms with the following argument on gravitation:

"On the contrary, if that were the case, the earth would not vie in keeping an even and uniform pace with the minutes of heaven, the pranas of the times. [...] All heavy things are attracted towards the center of the earth. [...] The earth on all its sides is the same; all people on earth stand upright, and all heavy things fall down to the earth by a law of nature, for it is the nature of the earth to attract and to keep things, as it is the nature of water to flow, that of fire to burn, and that of wind to set in motion… The earth is the only low thing, and seeds always return to it, in whatever direction you may throw them away, and never rise upwards from the earth."[24]

About the Earth's gravity he said: "Bodies fall towards the earth as it is in the nature of the earth to attract bodies, just as it is in the nature of water to flow

Ashok GadgilFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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It needs additional references or sources for verification. Tagged since January 2011. It needs sources or references that appear in third-party publications. Tagged since February

2007.

Ashok Gadgil (born 1950 in India) is a physicist with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) in Berkeley, and a professor in civil and environmental engineering at the University of

California, Berkeley. He is best known for "UV Waterworks" - a simple, effective and inexpensive water disinfection system.

Contents

[hide]

1 Education 2 Career 3 Awards 4 UV Waterworks 5 Darfur Stoves Project 6 Film 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Education

He has a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, an M.Sc. from IIT, Kanpur, and a B.Sc. from Bombay University, all in Physics.

[edit] Career

At LBNL, where Dr. Gadgil is Acting Director of the Environmental Energy Technologies Division, he leads a group of about 20 researchers conducting experimental and modeling research in indoor airflow and pollutant transport. Most of that work is focused on protecting building occupants from the threat of chemical and biological attacks. In recent years, he has worked on ways to inexpensively remove arsenic from Bangladesh drinking water, and on improving cookstoves for Darfur (Sudan) refugees.

Dr. Gadgil has substantial experience in technical, economic, and policy research on energy efficiency and its implementation - particularly in developing countries. He has authored or co-authored more than 70 journal papers, and more than 100 conference papers.

In 1998 and again in 2006, Dr. Gadgil was invited by the Smithsonian Institution's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation to speak at the National Museum of American History about his life and work.

[edit] Awards

Among his other awards are the Pew Fellowship in Conservation and the Environment in 1991 for his work on accelerating energy efficiency in developing countries, the World Technology Award for energy in 2002, the Tech Laureate Award in 2004, and in 2009, a 15th Annual Heinz

Award with special focus on the environment. .[1] Dr. Gadgil is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley, and was the Map-Ming Visiting Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at Stanford University.

[edit] UV Waterworks

UV Waterworks uses the UV light emitted by a low-pressure mercury discharge (similar to that in a fluorescent lamp) to disinfect drinking water. Effective disinfection at affordable cost is the primary and most important feature of UV Waterworks—allowing an entire system (including costs of pumps, filters, tanks, armpits, consumables, and employee salaries for operation) to sell drinking water at about 2 cents US for 12 liters even in deep rural areas, where personal incomes are commonly less than $1 US per day.

This business model, developed and implemented by WaterHealth International, makes safe drinking water affordable and accessible to even poor communities in developing countries. For UV Waterworks, Dr. Gadgil received the Discover Award in 1996 for the most significant environmental invention of the year, as well as the Popular Science Award for "Best of What is New - 1996".

[edit] Darfur Stoves Project

The Darfur Stoves Project seeks to protect Darfuri women by providing them with specially developed stoves which require less firewood, hence decreasing women’s exposure to violence while collecting firewood and their need to trade food rations for fuel.

The Darfur Stoves Project collaborates with international organizations such as Oxfam America and the Sudanese organization, Sustainable Action Group (SAG). By mid-2011 the Darfur Stoves Project has produced nearly 16,000 stoves.

The Darfur Stoves Project is the first initiative of the nonprofit organization, Technology Innovation for Sustainable Societies (TISS). The mission of TISS is to link research institutions, nonprofit organizations, and private distributors to increase the availability of affordable, appropriate technology to help improve the quality of life and create employment in places affected by poverty and conflict