Jagadish Chandra Bose
Jagadish Chandra Bose
জগদীশ চন্দ্র বসু
CSI, CIE, FRS |
Bose lecturing on the "nervous system" of plants at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1926
|
Born |
30 November 1858
Mymensingh, Bengal Presidency, British India (now Bangladesh) |
Died |
23 November 1937 (aged 78)
Giridih, Bengal Presidency, British India (now Giridih, Jharkhand, India) |
Residence |
Kolkata, Bengal Presidency, British India |
Citizenship |
British Indian |
Fields |
Physics, Biophysics, Biology, Botany, Archaeology, Bengali literature, Bengali science fiction |
Institutions |
University of Calcutta
University of Cambridge
University of London |
Alma mater |
University of Calcutta
Christ's College, Cambridge |
Academic advisors |
John Strutt (Rayleigh) |
Notable students |
Satyendra Nath Bose, Meghnad Saha |
Known for |
Millimetre waves
Radio
Crescograph
Contributions to Plant biology |
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) |
Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose,
[1] CSI,
[2] CIE,
[3] FRS[4] (
;
[5] Bengali pronunciation: [dʒɔgod̪iʃ tʃɔnd̪ro bosu]; 30 November 1858 – 23 November 1937) was a
Bengali polymath,
physicist,
biologist,
botanist,
archaeologist, as well as an early
writer of science fiction.
[6] 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.
[7] IEEE named him one of the
fathers of radio science.
[8] He is also considered the father of
Bengali science fiction. He also invented the
crescograph.
A crater on the moon has been named in his honour.
[9]
Born in
Mymensingh,
Bengal Presidency during the
British Raj,
[10] 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 signalling 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. To facilitate his research, he constructed automatic
recorders capable of registering extremely slight movements; these
instruments produced some striking results, such as Bose's demonstration
of an apparent power of feeling in plants, exemplified by the quivering
of injured plants. His books include
Response in the Living and Non-Living (1902) and
The Nervous Mechanism of Plants (1926).
Early life and education
Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose was born in
Mymensingh,
Bengal Presidency, (present day
Bangladesh)
[10] on 30 November 1858. His father, Bhagawan Chandra Bose, was a
Brahmo and leader of the
Brahmo Samaj and worked as a deputy magistrate/ assistant commissioner in
Faridpur,
[11] Bardhaman and other places.
[12]
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. 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.”[12]
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.
[12][13] He received a bachelor's degree from
University of Calcutta in 1879.
[11]
Bose wanted to go to England to compete for the
Indian Civil Service.
However, his father, a civil servant himself, cancelled the plan. He
wished his son to be a scholar, who would “rule nobody but himself.”
[14] Bose went to England to study Medicine at the
University of London. However, he had to quit because of ill health.
[15] The odour in the dissection rooms is also said to have exacerbated his illness.
[11]
Through the recommendation of
Anandamohan Bose, 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.
[16] 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.
[11][12] Later he was married to
Abala Bose, the renowned feminist, and social worker.
[17]
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 MA as well from it in 1884.
Joining Presidency College
Photo of Jagadish Bose and his wife Abala Bose, at the home of Edwin Herbert Lewis in
Chicago; from the September 1915 issue of
The Hindusthanee Student.
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.
[18]
Bose was not provided with facilities for research. On the contrary, he was a 'victim of racialism' with regard to his salary.
[18]
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.
[19]
As a form of protest, Bose refused to accept the salary cheque and
continued his teaching assignment for three years without accepting any
salary.
[18][20]
After time, the Director of Public Instruction and the Principal of the
Presidency College relented, and Bose's appointment was made permanent
with retrospective effect. He was given the full salary for the previous
three years in a lump sum.
[11]
Presidency College lacked a proper laboratory. Bose had to conduct his research in a small 24-square-foot (2.2 m
2) room.
[11] He devised equipment for the research with the help of one untrained tinsmith.
[18] 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, he carried out his research far into the night, in a small room
in his college.
[18]
Moreover, the policy of the British government for its colonies was
not conducive to attempts at original research. Bose spent his own 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.
[18]
Radio research
Bose's 60 GHz microwave apparatus at the Bose Institute, Kolkata, India. His receiver
(left) used a
galena crystal detector inside a horn antenna and galvanometer to detect microwaves. Bose invented the crystal radio detector,
waveguide,
horn antenna, and other apparatus used at microwave frequencies.
The Scottish theoretical physicist
James Clerk Maxwell mathematically predicted the existence of
electromagnetic radiation
of diverse wavelengths, but he died in 1879 before his prediction was
experimentally verified. Between 1886 and 1888 German physicist
Heinrich Hertz
published the results of his experiments that showed the existence of
electromagnetic waves in free space. Subsequently, British physicist
Oliver Lodge,
who had also been researching electromagnetic, conducted a
commemorative lecture in August 1894 (after Hertz's death) on the quasi
optical nature of "Hertzian waves" (radio waves) and demonstrated their
similarity to light and vision including reflection and transmission at
distances up to 50 meters. Lodge's work was published it in book form
and caught the attention of scientists in different countries including
Bose in India.
[21]
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.
[21]
During a November 1894 (or 1895
[21])
public demonstration at Town Hall of Kolkata, Bose ignited gunpowder
and rang a bell at a distance using millimetre range wavelength
microwaves.
[20]
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."
[21]
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.
[21]
Diagram of microwave receiver and transmitter apparatus, from Bose's 1897 paper.
Bose went to London on a lecture tour in 1896 and met Italian inventor
Guglielmo Marconi, who had been developing a radio wave
wireless telegraphy
system for over a year and was trying to market it to the British post
service. 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.
[22]
Place in radio development
Bose conducted his experiments during the years that saw the
development of radio into a communication medium. Bose work in radio
microwave optics was not related to radio communication
[23] but his refinements and writings may have had an influence on other radio inventors.
[24][25][26]
During this same period from late 1894 on Guglielmo Marconi was working
on a radio system specifically designed for wireless telegraphy and by
early 1896 was transmitting radio far beyond the short ranges that had
been predicted by physics.
[27]
In May 1895 Russian physicist Alexander Stepanovich Popov, also
inspired by Lodges experiment, built a radio wave base lightning
detector but did not pursue signalling until later.
[25]
Bose was the first to use a semiconductor junction to detect radio
waves, and he invented various now commonplace microwave components.
[25] In 1954, Pearson and Brattain gave priority to Bose for the use of a semi-conducting crystal as a detector of radio waves.
[25]
Further work at millimetre wavelengths was almost non-existent 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;
[25] 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, US, incorporates concepts from his original
1897 papers.
[25]
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. In fact, he had anticipated the existence of P-type and N-type
semiconductors."
[25]
Plant research
Jagadish Chandra Bose
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.
[28]
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 and the effect of temperature.
From the analysis of the variation of the cell
membrane potential of plants under different circumstances, he hypothesised that plants can "feel pain, understand affection etc."
Study of metal fatigue and cell response
Bose performed a comparative study of the fatigue response of various
metals and organic tissue in plants. He subjected metals to a
combination of mechanical, thermal, chemical, and electrical stimuli and
noted the similarities between metals and cells. Bose's experiments
demonstrated a cyclical fatigue response in both stimulated cells and
metals, as well as a distinctive cyclical fatigue and recovery response
across multiple types of stimuli in both living cells and metals.
Bose documented a characteristic electrical response curve of plant
cells to electrical stimulus, as well as the decrease and eventual
absence of this response in plants treated with anaesthetics or poison.
The response was also absent in zinc treated with
oxalic acid.
He noted a similarity in reduction of elasticity between cooled metal
wires and organic cells, as well as an impact on the recovery cycle
period of the metal.
[29][30]
Science fiction
In 1896, Bose wrote
Niruddesher Kahini (The Story of the Missing One), a short story that was later expanded and added to
Abyakta (অব্যক্ত) collection in 1921 with the new title
Palatak Tuphan (Runaway Cyclone). It was one of the first works of
Bengali science fiction.
[31][32] It has been translated into English by Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay.
[33]
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 any time made as to its construction, so that it has been open to
all the world to adopt it for practical and possibly moneymaking
purposes."
[11]
Bose declined an offer from a wireless apparatus manufacturer for
signing a remunerative agreement. Bose also recorded his attitude
towards patents in his inaugural lecture at the foundation of the
Bose Institute on 30 November 1917.
[citation needed]
Legacy
Acharya Bhavan, the residence of J C Bose built in 1902, has been turned to museum.
[34]
Bose's place in history has now been re-evaluated, and he is credited
with the invention of the first wireless detection device and the
discovery of millimetre length electromagnetic waves and considered a
pioneer in the field of biophysics.
[22]
Many of his instruments are still on display and remain largely
usable now, over 100 years later. They include various antennas,
polarisers, and waveguides, which remain in use in modern forms today.
To commemorate his birth centenary in 1958, the
JBNSTS scholarship programme was started in
West Bengal. In the same year, India issued a postage stamp bearing his portrait.
[35]
On 14 September 2012, Bose's experimental work in millimetre-band
radio was recognised as an IEEE Milestone in Electrical and Computer
Engineering, the first such recognition of a discovery in India.
[36]
Publications
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Wikisource has original text related to this article:
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- Journals
- Nature published about 27 papers.
- Bose J.C. (1902). "On Elektromotive Wave accompanying Mechanical Disturbance in Metals in Contact with Electrolyte". Proc. Roy. Soc. 70 (459–466): 273–294. doi:10.1098/rspl.1902.0029.
- Bose J.C. (1902). "Sur la response
electrique de la matiere vivante et animee soumise ä une
excitation.—Deux proceeds d'observation de la reponse de la matiere
vivante". Journal de Physique 4 (1): 481–491.
- Books
- Response in the Living and Non-living, 1902
- Plant response as a means of physiological investigation, 1906
- Comparative Electro-physiology: A Physico-physiological Study, 1907
- Researches on Irritability of Plants, 1913
- Physiology of the Ascent of Sap, 1923
- The physiology of photosynthesis, 1924
- The Nervous Mechanisms of Plants, 1926
- Plant Autographs and Their Revelations, 1927
- Growth and tropic movements of plants, 1929
- Motor mechanism of plants, 1928
- Other
- J.C. Bose, Collected Physical Papers. New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., 1927
- Abyakta (Bengali), 1922
Honours
Notes
- Page 3597 of Issue 30022. The London Gazette. (17 April 1917). Retrieved 1 September 2010.
- Page 9359 of Issue 28559. The London Gazette. (8 December 1911). Retrieved 1 September 2010.
- Page 4 of Issue 27511. The London Gazette. (30 December 1902). Retrieved 1 September 2010.
- Saha, M. N. (1940). "Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose. 1858–1937". Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society 3 (8): 2–0. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1940.0001.
- "Bose". Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary.
- A versatile genius, Frontline 21 (24), 2004.
- Chatterjee, Santimay and Chatterjee, Enakshi, Satyendranath Bose, 2002 reprint, p. 5, National Book Trust, ISBN 81-237-0492-5
- Sen, A. K. (1997). "Sir J.C. Bose and radio science". Microwave Symposium Digest 2 (8–13): 557–560. doi:10.1109/MWSYM.1997.602854. ISBN 0-7803-3814-6.
- Bose (crater)
- Editorial Board (2013). Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose. Edinburgh, Scotland: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. ISBN 9781593392925.
- Mahanti, Subodh. "Acharya Jagadis Chandra Bose". Biographies of Scientists. Vigyan Prasar, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India. Retrieved 12 March 2007.
- Mukherji, pp. 3–10.
- Murshed, Md Mahbub. "Bose, (Sir) Jagadish Chandra". Banglapedia. Asiatic Society of Bangladesh. Retrieved 12 March 2007.
- "Pursuit and Promotion of Science : The Indian Experience" (PDF). Indian National Science Academy. Retrieved 1 October 2013.
- "Jagadish Chandra Bose". People. Calcuttaweb.com. Retrieved 10 March 2007.
- "Bose, Jagadis Chandra (BS881JC)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
- Sengupta, Subodh Chandra and Bose, Anjali (editors), 1976/1998, Sansad Bangali Charitabhidhan (Biographical dictionary) Vol I, (Bengali), p23, ISBN 81-85626-65-0
- Mukherji, pp. 11–13
- Gangopadhyay, Sunil, Protham Alo, 2002 edition, p. 377, Ananda Publishers Pvt. Ltd.. ISBN 81-7215-362-7
- "Jagadish Chandra Bose" (PDF). Pursuit and Promotion of Science: The Indian Experience (Chapter 2). Indian National Science Academy. 2001. pp. 22–25. Retrieved 12 March 2007.
- Mukherji, pp. 14–25
- Bondyopadhyay,
P.K. (January 1998). "Sir J. C. Bose's Diode Detector Received
Marconi's First Transatlantic Wireless Signal of December 1901 (The
"Italian Navy Coherer" Scandal Revisited)". Proceedings of the IEEE 86 (1): 259–285. doi:10.1109/5.658778.
- Sungook Hong, Wireless: From Marconi's Black-box to the Audion, MIT Press – 2001, page 199
- Sungook Hong, Wireless: From Marconi's Black-box to the Audion, MIT Press – 2001, page 22
- Emerson, D. T. (1997). "The work of Jagadis Chandra Bose: 100 years of MM-wave research". IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Research 45 (12): 2267–2273. Bibcode:1997imsd.conf..553E. doi:10.1109/MWSYM.1997.602853. ISBN 9780986488511. reprinted in Igor Grigorov, Ed., Antentop, Vol. 2, No.3, pp. 87–96.
- Jagadish Chandra Bose: The Real Inventor of Marconi’s Wireless Receiver; Varun Aggarwal, NSIT, Delhi, India
- Sungook Hong, Wireless: From Marconi's Black-box to the Audion, MIT Press – 2001, page 21
- Wildon,
D. C.; Thain, J. F.; Minchin, P. E. H.; Gubb, I. R.; Reilly, A. J.;
Skipper, Y. D.; Doherty, H. M.; O'Donnell, P. J.; Bowles, D. J. (1992).
"Electrical signalling and systemic proteinase inhibitor induction in
the wounded plant". Nature 360 (6399): 62–5. Bibcode:1992Natur.360...62W. doi:10.1038/360062a0.
- Response in the Living and Non-Living by Sir Jagadis Chandra Bose – Project Gutenberg. Gutenberg.org (3 August 2006). Retrieved 7 July 2012.
- Jagadis Bose (2009). Response in the Living and Non-Living. Plasticine. ISBN 978-0-9802976-9-0.
- "Bengal". The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Retrieved 5 September 2014.
- "Symposium at Christ's College to celebrate a genius". University of Cambridge. 27 November 2008. Retrieved 26 January 2009.[dead link]
- Jagadish Chandra Bose. "Runaway Cyclone". Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay. Strange Horizons. Retrieved 5 September 2014.
- Acharya Bhavan Opens Its Doors to Visitors. The Times of India. 3 July 2011.
- "J C Bose: The Scientist Who Proved That Plants Too Can Feel". Phila Mirror: The Indian Philately Journal. 30 November 2010. Retrieved 3 August 2012.
- "First IEEE Milestones in India: The work of J.C. Bose and C.V. Raman to be recognized". the Institute. 7 September 2012. Retrieved 14 September 2012.
- "A new name now for grand old Indian Botanical Gardens". The Hindu. 26 June 2009. Retrieved 26 June 2009.
References
Mukherji, Visvapriya,
Jagadish Chandra Bose, second edition,
1994, Builders of Modern India series, Publications Division, Ministry
of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India,