Satyendra Nath Bose, 1 January 1894 - 4 February 1974

Abstract

S. N. Bose was one of India’s most eminent scientists. Bose’s achievements in scientific research were not as sustained or as numerous as those of his contemporaries like C. V. Raman,(1)Meghnad Saha(2)and K. S. Krishnan,(3)together with whom he became a pioneer of education and research in modern physics in India. But the circumstances of Bose’s intellectual development were unusual and he was destined to play an inspiring role in the scientific and cultural life of his country. Bose’s novel derivation of Planck’s radiation formula, the only significant contribution which he made to physics, came at a turning point between the old quantum theory of Planck, Einstein, Bohr and Sommerfeld and the new quantum mechanics of Heisenberg, Dirac and Schrodinger. Bose sent his paper early in June 1924 to Albert Einstein who recognized its merit, translated it into German, and had it published in theZeitschrift für Physik[6]. During the summer of 1924 Einstein also received, from Paul Langevin in Paris, a copy of the doctoral thesis of Louis de Broglie(4)dealing with the wave aspects of matter. Bose’s work became the point of departure for Einstein’s investigation on the quantum theory of monatomic ideal gases and ‘gas degeneracy’, leading to his prediction of the condensation phenomenon.(5)Einstein recognized the importance of de Broglie’s ideas and also made use of them in his investigation.(5)In turn, these papers of de Broglie and Einstein stimulated Schrodinger(6)to develop his wave mechanics. The ‘Bose-Einstein statistics’ immediately fitted into the framework of quantum mechanics and enshrined Bose’s name in physics for ever. Bose lived the legend of this fateful encounter with Einstein throughout the rest of his life.