Today India celebrates the 161st Birth Anniversary of Sir Jagdish Chandra Bose, the Founder of Modern Science in Indian Subcontinent. He pioneered the investigation of radio and microwave opticals and laid the foundation of experimental science. He proved plants have life.
He was born on 30th November 1858 at Bikrampur, now Bangladesh. He completed his schooling from St. Xavier’s College Kolkata and went to study at University College London.
He was the first scholar in the world to induct interdisciplinary research by examining plants from the physics point of view, he invented crescograph to measure the plant responses to stimuli and proved parallelism between animals and plants.
He was first to use semiconductors junctions to detect radio signals. Many of his experiments were possible because of the instruments he invented such as crescograph, photosynthetic bubbler, etc.
Jagdish Chandra Bose is a recognized and respected name across the world, but he suffered racial discrimination and lack of fundings and equipment during his researches. His experiments and findings were received doubtingly for their emotional style of reporting.
He was the first Asian who was granted a US patent in 1904. He and Mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujam, were also the first Asian fellows of the Royal Society, London.
Sir Jagdish Chandra Bose was also a part of Asia on the International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation of the League of Nations along with Albert Einstein, Madame Curie, and Robert Andrews Millikan.
J.C. Bose is also regarded as the father of Bengali Science Fiction. In 2004, Bose was ranked 7 in the BBC’s poll of Greatest Bengali of all time.
In 2016, Google dedicated a doodle on the 158th birth anniversary of Jagdish Chandra Bose. IEEE has recognized him as one of the Fathers of Radio Science.
To honor Jagdish Chandra Bose’s achievement and his contribution to modern science, a small crater on the moon was named after him.