Google on Wednesday celebrated the birthday of physicist, biologist, biophysicist and botanist Sir Jagdish Chandra Bose’s birthday with a creative doodle. The doodle shows the legendary scientist sitting in his lab with a Crescograph and a plant next to him.
Born on November 30, 1858, in British India’s Bengal Presidency, Bose is known for his inventions that transformed the world of communication.
He started his education in a vernacular school. After receiving his bachelor’s degree from the University of Calcutta in 1879, he got admission into Christ College, Cambridge. He received the Natural Science Tripos from the University of Cambridge and a BSc from the University of London in 1884.
On his 158th birthday, here are eleven interesting facts that gen next must know about him:
1. Sir Jagdish Chandra Bose is known as the father of radio science. He invented Mercury Coherer, a device that was used by Guglielmo Marconi to receive the radio signal in his first transatlantic radio communication over a distance of 2000 miles.
2. He was the first scientist to demonstrate that plants are living beings and that they can feel pain like animals.
3. He invented the Crescograph, a device used to measure growth in plants. The device could magnify the motion of plant tissues to about 10,000 times of their actual size.
4. There is a small crater on the Moon that has been named after Jagadish Chandra Bose.
5. He conducted his experiments at his place in a small 24-square-feet room, which is inadequate for conducting scientific experiments.
6. He is known as the father of Bengali science fiction. His book Niruddesher Kahini was the first major work of Bengali science fiction.
7. He was the pioneer in the field of microwave devices. His contributions were recognised by the likes of Lord Kelvin, Rabindranath Tagore, Francis Darwin and Lord Rayleigh.
8. He gave his first demonstration of electromagnetic waves in 1895, where he sent an EM across 75 feet to remotely ring a bell and to explode some gunpowder.
9. He holds the first patent to invent a solid-state diode detector to detect EM waves.
10. He was a Fellow at the Royal Society, a Knight Bachelor, a Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire, a member of the League of Nations’ Committee for Intellectual Cooperation and a Companion of the Order of the Star in India.
11. As a professor in Presidency College, Calcutta, he was subjected to racism. While his British peers got Rs 300, he was given only Rs 200 for teaching.
