Early Life
Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman was born in 1888 in Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu, to a physics and mathematics lecturer. A prodigy, he passed his matriculation at 11 and graduated from Presidency College, Madras, at 16 with gold medals in physics and English. Ill health prevented him studying abroad, so he joined the Indian Finance Service in Calcutta while doing research in his spare time at the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science.
Major Discoveries
- 01Raman effect (1928): light changes wavelength when scattered by molecules
- 02Explained why the sea is blue through molecular light scattering
- 03Studied the acoustics of Indian drums (tabla, mridangam) and the violin
- 04Raman–Nath theory of diffraction of light by ultrasonic waves
- 05Research on the optics of crystals, diamonds and colloids
Famous Experiments
- 01Passed filtered sunlight through liquids and saw a faint new colour in the scattered light
- 02Used a mercury arc lamp and spectrograph to photograph Raman lines
- 03On a ship voyage in 1921, observed the Mediterranean with a Nicol prism to study its blue colour
Awards & Honors
- 01Nobel Prize in Physics (1930)
- 02Knighthood (1929)
- 03Bharat Ratna (1954)
- 04Lenin Peace Prize (1957)
- 05Hughes Medal of the Royal Society (1930)
Legacy
Raman spectroscopy is now used worldwide in chemistry, medicine, forensics and material science. India celebrates National Science Day on 28 February, the date of his discovery. He founded the Raman Research Institute in Bangalore.
Fun Facts
- 01His apparatus for the Nobel discovery cost about ₹200
- 02He booked tickets to Stockholm months before the Nobel was announced
- 03His nephew Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar also won a Nobel Prize in Physics
- 04He was the first director of the Indian Institute of Science who was Indian