P.N. Ghosh – The Pioneer of Applied Physics in India

Abstract

Rajinder Singh’s journey in history of science started in 1995 at University of Oldenburg in Germany and he has already completed half a century of historical biographies with this book under review, mostly focussing on non-descript scientists of Calcutta School of Physics. The book under review describes the achievements of P.N. Ghosh, one of the earlier students of C.V. Raman, who has been recognized as the founder of Applied Physics in Calcutta University. In the Preface, the author writes: “The period from 1920 to 1930 is often referred to as the "Golden Era" of Indian physics. During this time, M.N. Saha formulated the Saha ionization equation (1920), which helped explain stellar structures; S.N. Bose co-developed the Bose-Einstein statistics (1924); and C.V. Raman discovered the Raman effect (1928), named after him. With this discovery, he laid the foundation for Raman Spectroscopy”.