Satyendra Nath Bose Biography

Satyendra Nath Bose was an Indian physicist who discovered bosons, the "God particle". He collaborated with Albert Einstein on the Bose-Einstein Condensate to define one of two main types of subatomic particles. To the dismay of the Indian government and people, much of the credit for discovering the boson, or "God particle," was given to British physicist Peter Higgs.

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Satyendra Nath Bose Education and Early Life 

Satyendra Nath Bose was born on January 1, 1894, in Calcutta (now Kolkata), West Bengal, India. He had six sisters and was the eldest of them all. Bose was a genius, since the very beginning. He topped the entrance exam of Hindu School, one of India's oldest schools, and ranked fifth in the order of merit. Following that, Bose joined Presidency College, in Kolkata, where he had studied with renowned scientists Jagadish Chandra Bose and Prafulla Chandra Ray in an intermediate science degree.

Bose graduated from Presidency College with a Bachelor of Science degree in combined Mathematics in 1913 and a Master of Science in the same subject from Calcutta University in 1915. He acquired such high marks in each of the degree courses that he not only ranked first but also set a new record score for the latter in the University of Calcutta, which is yet to be surpassed by any student. Meghnad Saha, a fellow student who would eventually work with Bose, stood second in the exam.

Bose married Usha Devi at the age of 20 while pursuing his two degrees. In 1916, Bose began his studies on the theory of relativity as a researcher at the University of Calcutta, where he had completed his master's degree. In addition, he established new departments and laboratories to offer undergraduate and graduate degree courses.

Satyendra Nath Bose Invention, Research, and Teaching Career

S.N. Bose worked as a lecturer in the Physics department at the University of Calcutta while he was still studying. In 1919, he and Meghnad Saha published the first English-language book based on translations of Albert Einstein's original special and general relativity papers from German and French. For several years after that, they continued to publish articles on theoretical physics and pure mathematics.

In 1921, Bose joined the newly founded Physics department at the University of Dhaka and went on to establish new departments, laboratories, and libraries where he could teach advanced degree courses. In 1924, he published a paper in which he deduced Planck's quantum radiation equation without using the theory of Classical Physics. He accomplished it by counting states with equal attributes. The study would go on to be pivotal in the development of the area of quantum statistics. Bose sent the manuscript to Einstein in Germany, who recognized its relevance and translated it into German before submitting it to the prominent scientific journal Zeitschrift für Physik on Bose's behalf. Following the publication, Bose was granted a two-year leave to work in Europe at X-ray and crystallography laboratories, where he collaborated with Einstein and Marie Curie, among others.

Einstein had taken Bose's idea and applied it to atoms, predicting the formation of the Bose-Einstein Condensate, a dense concentration of bosons— particles with integer spin named after Bose.

Bose returned to the University of Dhaka in 1926 after his research work in Europe. Despite the fact that he lacked a Ph.D., Einstein proposed that Bose be made a professor, and he was appointed the head of the Physics department. Bose, on the other hand, did not publish any journal for a long time after his return. Bose's interests meandered into other subjects, including philosophy, literature, and the Indian independence struggle, according to a July 2012 New York Times story describing him as the "Father of the God Particle”.

He published another Physics paper in 1937 and worked on unified field theories in the early 1950’s. Bose returned to Calcutta in 1945 after 25 years in Dhaka, where he continued to research and teach for the rest of his life.

Recognition and Honours

Several Nobel Prizes have been granted for work on the boson and the Bose-Einstein Condensate ideas. Physicist Jayant Narlikar named Bose's discovery as one of the top ten achievements of the 20th-century Indian Science. Bose's work on particle statistics clarified the behaviour of photons and "opened the door to new ideas on statistics of Microsystems that obey the rules of quantum theory", according to physicist Jayant Narlikar. When asked how he felt about the Nobel Prize snub, Bose simply said, "I have gotten all the praise I deserve.".

Bose was awarded the Padma Vibhushan, India's second-highest civilian award, by the Indian government in 1954. He was named the National Professor five years later, the highest honour bestowed on a scholar in the country. For the next 15 years, Bose remained in that role. Bose also served as the President of the Indian Physical Society and the National Institute of Science, as well as an adviser to the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. He was elected the President of the Indian Statistical Institute and general President of the Indian Science Congress. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1958.

The S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences was established in Salt Lake, Calcutta, some 12 years after Bose's death. Regardless of the honours and recognition granted by his own country, Bose was largely ignored by the world community as a scientist who contributed significantly. People credited British Physicist Peter Higgs and the Higgs boson particle when they praised international cooperation that resulted in a breakthrough in recognizing the presence of the boson particle in the summer of 2012.

In a July 10, 2012 article for The Huffington Post, "many in India were smarting over what they viewed as a blow on one of their best scientists." "Many people in our nation (India) have been mystified, and even annoyed, that the Indian half of the now-acknowledged 'God particle' is being carried in lower case", according to an editorial published earlier that week in The Economic Times. According to the editorial, what people don't comprehend is that naming all bosons after Bose "really signals greater importance".

Other Interests

S. N. Bose studied biotechnology and literature in addition to physics (Bengali and English). He studied chemistry, geology, zoology, anthropology, engineering, and a variety of other subjects in depth. He spent a lot of time, as a Bengali, promoting Bengali as a teaching language, translating scientific papers into Bengali, and encouraging the region's growth.

Legacy

To honour Satyendranath Bose's contributions to science, a class of elementary subatomic particles known as bosons was named after him. Despite the fact that seven Nobel Prizes have been given for work on S. N. Bose's conceptions of the boson, Bose-Einstein statistics, and Bose-Einstein condensate, Bose himself has not received one.

In the S. N. Bose book ‘The Scientific Edge’, physicist Jayant Narlikar observed:

One of the top ten achievements of twentieth-century Indian science was Satyendra Nath Bose's work on particle statistics (c. 1922), which clarified the behaviour of photons (light particles in an enclosure) and opened the door to new ideas on statistics of Microsystems that obey the rules of quantum theory, was one of the top ten achievements of twentieth-century Indian science and could be considered for the Nobel Prize category.

When Bose was asked that question, he simply replied, "I have gotten all the recognition I deserve.". This is likely due to the fact that in the fields of science to which he belonged, what matters is not whether one wins a Nobel Prize, but whether one's name will be remembered in scientific discussions for decades to come.

Interesting Facts About SN Bose 

Some of the interesting facts about Satyendra Bose are listed below.

• The theoretical physicist was born on January 1, 1894, in Calcutta (now Kolkata).

• Bose's most significant contribution is his collaboration with Einstein on quantum physics and relativity theory.

• Bose-Einstein condensate is a state of matter predicted by Bose and Einstein for a dilute gas of bosons.

• In 1954, the Government of India gave him the Padma Vibhushan, India's second-highest civilian award, for his contributions to science and research.

• The S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences was also founded by the government in 1986.

• In 1937, Rabindranath Tagore dedicated his science book, ‘Visva–Parichay,' to Bose.

Satyendranath Bose was an Indian mathematician and physicist who is best known for inventing the Boson particle, also known as the ‘God particle’. K. Banerji, D. S. Kothari, S. N. Bagchi, and A. K. Dutta nominated Satyendra Nath Bose for the Nobel Prize in Physics for the contributions made by him in the unified field theory and Bose-Einstein Statistics. Bose, the world-famous scientist is known for co-developing the Bose-Einstein Condensate and the foundation for Bose-Einstein statistics along with Albert Einstein. Bose died at the age of 80, on February 4, 1974.