ACK-085: Jagadis Chandra Bose

ACK #325 (#699)

Sir Jagadis Chandra Bose: Indian physicist, plant physiologist & Science fiction writer

Jagadis Chandra Bose was a physicist at Presidency College in Calcutta, India, who pioneered the investigation of microwave optics in the later 1800's. He invented radio communication before Marconi (check links: 1, 2, 3). Many of his instruments are still on display and remain largely usable now, over 100 years later. They include various antennas, polarizers, and waveguides, all of which remain in use in modern forms today.

He was also known as an excellent teacher who believed in the use of classroom demonstrations, a trait apparently picked up while studying with Lord Rayleigh at Cambridge. He influenced many later Indian physicists, including Satyendra Bose (no relation) who later went on to be an influential figure in 20th century physics.

Later he turned his attention to plant physiology, where he gained a new sort of fame with continued claims that plants had nervous responses (of a sort) similar to those of animals. This led him to explore the effects of drugs on plants, and later, non-organic materials such as metals, which he claimed showed similar effects. Much of this was demonstrated through the use of a device he invented called the crescograph, which magnified mechanical movements many times and allowed for the direct study of plant growth.

(~ From Knowledgerush.com)

Life Summary

1858 - Born on the 30th of November, in Mymensingh (now in Bangladesh), Bengal. Indian plant physiologist and physicist whose invention of highly sensitive instruments for the detection of minute responses by living organisms to external stimuli enabled him to anticipate the parallelism between animal and plant tissues noted by later biophysicists.

1880 - He was later sent to a hostel in an English school in Calcutta. After his graduation from Sr. Xavier’s College in Calcutta, Bose left for England for further studies.

1884 - Bose took his B.A. degree in the natural sciences with Physics, Chemistry, and Botany, from Cambridge, and simultaneously a B.Sc. degree from the University of London.

1885 - Bose became the officiating Professor of Physics at the prestigious Presidency College in Calcutta.

1895 - Bose designed a wireless telegraphy system with very sensitive receivers.

1896 - Bose wrote Niruddesher Kahini, the first major work in Bangla science fiction. Later, he added the story in the Obbakto book as Polatok Tufan. He was the first science fiction writer in the Bengali language.

1902-1906 - Sir Jagadis Chandra Bose had two of his pioneering books published. The first, Response in the Living and Non-Living was published and Plant Responses. He was the first Indian to get a US Patent (No: 755840) for "detector for electrical disturbances" in 1904.

1917 - He set up the Bose Temple of Learning in Calcutta which trains international scientists even today.

1920 - He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society.

1937 - Died on November 23rd on Giridih, Bengal Presidency, British India.

1997 - According to the June edition of the journal published by the U.S.-based Institute of Electronics and Electrical Engineers (IEEE), one of the most powerful radio telescopes in the world, installed at the National Astronomy Observatory in Tucson, Arizona, U.S., was built on a device originally developed by Bose.

Read about more at Banglapedia, Wikipedia, Answers.com, Findarticles.com, Light-science.com, novelguide.com

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This ACK is contributed by Apoorva Chandar. All thanks & credits go to him.