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Satyendra Nath Bose (1894-1974)

Science: Mathematics, Physics
Known for: Bose-Einstein condensate, Bose-Einstein statistics, Bose gas

Indian mathematician and theoretical physicist, known for his contributions to the field of statistical mechanics, in collaboration with Albert Einstein.

Bose graduated in applied mathematics from the University of Calcutta. He published a number of papers in fields as diverse as crystallography and unified field theory while lecturing at the universities of Dacca and Calcutta. His paper, Planck’s Law and the Hypothesis of Light Quanta, published in 1924, in which he derived Planck’s equation purely from quantum theory, using his model for the behaviour of a group of photons, was sent to Einstein. Highly impressed, Einstein entered into a collaboration with Bose, and further extended Bose’s work on the behaviour of photons, which are particles of zero spin, resulting in what is now known as Bose-Einstein statistics.

The impact of Bose-Einstein statistics has proved to be wide-ranging, explaining, for example, the action of lasers and the superfluidity of helium at low temperatures (the helium nucleus also has integral spin).

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Article: “Satyendra Nath Bose”, Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2007
http://encarta.msn.com © 1997-2007 Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
Picture: Satyendra Nath Bose. Author: unknown, 1925.

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