Author of the Lesson C. V. Raman Is Shubashree Desikan

C. V. RAMAN

Author of the lesson C. V. Raman is Shubashree Desikan.
C. V. Raman was born in a village near Tiruchirapalli in South India.
He was born on 8th November, 1888.
C. V. Raman’s parents were R. Chandrasekara Iyer and Parvathi Ammal.
Raman’s father took up a job as a lecturer in Mrs. A. V. Narasimha Rao College.
R. Chandra Sekhara Iyer taught Physics, Mathematics and Physical Geography.
C. V. Raman was not physically strong.
Raman was very intelligent and he preferred to read books and work at his studies.
Raman was a voracious reader.
Three books that he read in his childhood moulded his mental and spiritual outlook. They are
Edwin Arnold’s -Light of Asia
(which is a story of Gauthama Buddha),
Elements of Euclid -A treatise on Classical Geometry,
The Sensations of Tone -by German Scientist Helmholtz
on the properties of sound waves.
Raman completed school when he was just eleven years old.
He spent two years studying intermediate in Mrs. A. V. Narasimharao College.
When he was only thirteen years old, he went to Madras to join B.A. course at Presidency College.
On seeing the 13 yr old in B. A. Class, English Professor Mr. E. H. Elliot asked him if he really belonged to the Junior B. A. class.
Raman stood first in B. A. Examinations.
C. V. Raman’s teachers asked him to prepare for the Indian Civil Services (ICS)Exam.
Raman had to undergo a medical examination.
The Civil Surgeon of Madras declared him medically unfit to travel to England.
Raman failed in the Medical Examination.
“I shall ever be grateful to this man.” Raman was referring to the Civil Surgeon of Madras over here when he made this statement.
Raman joined M.A. Physics class in Presidency College, Madras.
C. V. Raman is famous for his original thinking.
“Philosophical Magazine” is a famous British Journal.
Raman passed the MA examination in January 1907. He stood first in the University.
C.V. Raman married Lokasundari, who belonged to Madurai.
C.V. Raman wrote Financial Services Examination
Financial Civil Services examination is a forerunner of Indian Administrative and Audit Services .
He topped the Financial Civil services exam.
He was given a fabulous amount of Rs. 400.
One day, when riding to work in a tram, Raman spotted a signboard with the words “Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science.
He got off the tram and walked into the building of Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science.
The Laboratory in the building “Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science’ is the place where Raman and his team performed the legendary experiments on Light.
His papers appeared in International Journals such as ‘Nature’ and ‘The Philosophical Magazine’ published in England and ‘The Physical Review’, published in the USA.
Raman liked to teach and would give popular lectures in Calcutta.
C. V. Raman introduced in India the practice of giving live demonstrations but sadly this seems to have died with him.
In IACS, Raman chose to study Musical Instruments first.
He developed several ideas which he called ‘Remarkable Resonances’.
Raman’s studies on the Violin were extensive and were later published as the book entitled “On the Mechanical Theory of Vibrations of Musical Instruments of the Violin Family with Experimental Results – Part 1”.
Till 1920, Acoustics continued to interest him.
Besides the Violin, Raman studied the Veena, Tambura, Mridangam, Tabla and others.
Ashuthosh Mookherjee offered him the position of Palit Professor of Physics at the University.
One of the conditions laid down by the Trustees of Calcutta University was that the person appointed must have had “foreign experience”
The rule of having ‘foreign experience’ was waived and C. V. Raman was appointed as Palit Professor.
Some of the well known names among Raman’s brilliant students are K. R. Ramanathan, K.S. Krishnan and Suri Bhagavatham.
In 1921. The University of Calcutta conferred on him an Honorary Doctorate.
C.V. Raman went overseas for the first time in 1921.
He went to attend the University Congress at Oxford where he represented Calcutta University.
On his voyage back to India, Raman spent hours watching the sea from the deck of his ship and was struck by its colour.
According to Raleigh, “the dark blue of the deep sea has nothing to do with the colour of water but is simply the blue of the sky seen in reflection.”
Raman watched the sea intently, used the simple tools to do experiments to capture the colour of the sea and published a paper explaining his observations on the Mediterranean Sea in the Journal “Nature”.
Raman discovered that water molecules could scatter light just like air molecules.
This was a very important and radical discovery in these days.
In 1922, he wrote a brilliant essay entitled “The Molecular Diffraction of Light.”
He speculated that light may exist in quanta i.e. as massless particles of energy.
If light exists as particles or quanta then, a scattering of the light could change its frequency as well as intensity.
In 1923 – Compton Effect was discovered.
One of Raman’s students, K.R. Ramanathan, first spotted the phenomenon of scattering of light in 1923.
They called this effect as ‘feeble fluorescence’.
Raman Effect – “ Light can undergo a scattering through a liquid resulting in a change in its frequency”
On 28th February, 1928 they discovered Raman Effect.
28th Feb is celebrated as National Science Day.
Raman received Nobel Prize for Physics in 1930.
Raman became Director of Indian Institute of Science, Banglore.
He retired as Director of Indian Institute of Science, Banglore in 1948.
He gave equal time to research and organizational work.
He did a lot of important research and nurtured many good students during his tenure as Director of IISc.
Raman set up Raman Research Institute in Banglore.
He also took care of Indian Academy of Science.
He also edited the Journals ‘ Current Science’ and ‘The Proceedings of the Academy’
C. V. Raman died on 21st November, 1970.
His mortal remains were consigned to flames in the Institute Campus itself.