Prof. C. N. R. Rao's Lecture at IIT Bombay, 11th Jan 2013

Attended an amazing talk by Prof. C. N. R. Rao just an hour ago. What an enthusiastic fellow till now in the age of 80. He decorated his lecture by the showcase of various extraordinary minds of 18th and 19th century and the connections of various approaches in science amongst all those great minds. He believes that it is needed a proper knowledge of the history of those pioneer groups of modern sciences.

It helps in good understanding of science and to connect properly while we are approaching with innovative ideas. We can understand the key elements from those great people and it helps to connect our new ideas in proper direction.

A few key points I understood are:

* Science's contribution to us is amazing and what is my contribution as an individual to science? Just think about it???

* Be selfish towards yourself and not to the society.

* Know your integrity and contribute as an individual to the science and society. Thus you, your surrounding and slowly everything will change. (Michael Faraday did everything individually without any guidance, students; amazing!!!)

* Science does not follow any holidays (Heisenberg reported the uncertainty principle during a vacation time in the absence of his guide). Thus we should work hard to change our society.

* China contributes 14.5% of science, U.S.A 16.5% and India's contribution is only 2.5%.

His body language reflected a lot of things which I could feel.

Really a devoted person of Bharat Mata!!!

Author: Chandan Das

https://sites.google.com/site/chandandasiitb/
Word Count: 247

Ashoke Sen's Lecture at IIT Bombay Techfest Lecture Series, 2013

Simple person with simple life style to make complex concepts into simple and well understood to the common people is the motif of life of a renowned scientist, whose contribution to the physics is invaluable. Ashoke Sen, the prestigious fundamental physics award winner for his contribution to the ''String Theory'' was invited to the technical festival (Techfest) of IIT Bombay on 4th Jan 2012 lecture series.

Ashoke Sen during open interaction with students

My previous believe and the information I had was totally imperceptible about him paying attention as a reclusive shy scientist. In the mean time I would like to mention that Sen is not shy/reclusive, rather he likes to be simpler and may be the simplest way of living. He was wearing the big “Chasma” (can be seen in any other Google Images), simple T-shirt... after all a man with simplicity. My wish came true as I got the opportunity to attend his live lecture in this event of Techfest. His presentation and interaction was one the simplest of all I have ever attended. At that time a question came to my mind, is Ashoke Sen a big fan of Einstein??? Einstein's popular quote "to make simpler something is the toughest job" exactly the way Ashoke Sen was trying to convey the message during his presentation.

  

His lecture includes the basic parts

* The basic understanding of elementary particles (Quarks, Leptons, Mediators, Higgs).

* Connections between Quantum Mechanics and Modern Theory of Relativity.

* Imagination of 9 dimensions, indeed it is a bit difficult to understand the four dimensions.

String theory is a concept based on modern relativity theory and quantum mechanics. His innovative ideas and his efforts may be substantially beneficial in the search of a unified theory. He says that to find a phase of string theory that has exactly the elementary particles one can observe in nature is an open problem to be solved.

Author: Chandan Das

https://sites.google.com/site/chandandasiitb/
Word Count: 311