C. V. Raman facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Sir C. V. Raman FRS
Raman in 1930
Born	Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman (1888-11-07)7 November 1888 Tiruchirapalli, Madras, British India
Died	21 November 1970(1970-11-21) (aged 82) Bangalore, Mysore, India
Alma mater	University of Madras (B.A., M.A.)
Known for	Raman effect
Spouse(s)	Lokasundari Ammal ​ (m. 1908)​
Children	2, including Venkatraman Radhakrishnan
Awards	Fellow of the Royal Society (1924) Matteucci Medal (1928) Knight Bachelor (1930) Hughes Medal (1930) Nobel Prize in Physics (1930) Bharat Ratna (1954) Lenin Peace Prize (1957)
Scientific career
Fields	Physics
Institutions	Indian Finance Department Rajabazar Science College (University of Calcutta) Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science Indian Institute of Science Raman Research Institute
Doctoral students	G. N. Ramachandran Vikram Ambalal Sarabhai Shivaramakrishnan Pancharatnam
Other notable students	Kariamanickam Srinivasa Krishnan K. R. Ramanathan
Signature

Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman (born 7 November 1888 – died 21 November 1970) was an amazing Indian physicist. He is famous for his work on how light behaves. He discovered something called the "Raman effect" or "Raman scattering."

With his student K. S. Krishnan, he found that when light shines through a clear material, some of the light changes its wavelength and frequency. This was a completely new discovery about light! For this important finding, Raman won the 1930 Nobel Prize in Physics. He was the first person from Asia to win a Nobel Prize in any science field.

Raman was a very smart child. He finished high school by age 13. He got his first college degree in physics at 16 from the University of Madras. Even before he finished his master's degree, he published his first science paper in 1906. At 19, he started working for the Indian government in Kolkata. There, he found the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS). This was India's first research center. It allowed him to do his own science experiments, where he made big discoveries about sound and light.

In 1917, he became a physics professor at the University of Calcutta. On a trip to Europe, he saw the Mediterranean Sea. He wondered why it was blue. He realized the common idea about the sea's color was wrong. In 1926, he started the Indian Journal of Physics. He moved to Bangalore in 1933 to lead the Indian Institute of Science. He also started the Indian Academy of Sciences that year. In 1948, he opened the Raman Research Institute, where he worked until he passed away.

The Raman effect was discovered on 28 February 1928. This day is now celebrated every year in India as National Science Day. In 1954, the Indian government gave him the Bharat Ratna, which is India's highest award for civilians.

Early Life and Learning

C. V. Raman was born in Tiruchirapalli, in what was then British India. His parents were Chandrasekhara Ramanathan Iyer and Parvathi Ammal. He was one of eight children. His father was a school teacher.

In 1892, his family moved to Visakhapatnam. His father became a physics teacher at a college there. Raman went to St Aloysius' Anglo-Indian High School in Visakhapatnam. He finished his first major exams at age 11 and another at 13, winning scholarships for both.

In 1902, Raman joined Presidency College in Madras (now Chennai). His father also taught there. In 1904, he earned his B.A. degree from the University of Madras. He was first in his class and won gold medals in physics and English.

When he was 18, while still a student, he published his first science paper. It was about how light bends, and it appeared in a British science magazine in 1906. He got his M.A. degree in 1907 with top honors. His second paper, about how liquids behave, was published that same year.

Raman's physics teacher wanted him to study in England. But a doctor said Raman was not strong enough for the cold weather there.

His Career

Raman's older brother worked for the Indian Finance Service, a very important government job. Since Raman couldn't study abroad, he also joined the Finance Service in 1907. He got the top score on the entrance exam. He was sent to Calcutta (now Kolkata) as an Assistant Accountant General.

In Calcutta, he was very impressed by the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS). This was India's first research center, started in 1876. He made friends there and got permission to do research in his free time. His first paper from the institute was published in 1907. This encouraged IACS to start its own science journal in 1909, where Raman wrote many articles.

Raman moved to different cities for his government job, including Rangoon (now in Myanmar) and Nagpur. In 1911, he was promoted and sent back to Calcutta.

From 1915, the University of Calcutta started sending students to Raman for research at IACS. By 1919, he had guided over a dozen students. After the founder of IACS passed away, Raman became an Honorary Professor and Secretary. He called this time the "golden era" of his life.

In 1917, Raman became the first Palit Professor of Physics at the Rajabazar Science College in Calcutta. He had to quit his government job, which meant taking a much lower salary. This was seen as a big sacrifice for science. Some people at the university didn't like his appointment because he didn't have a PhD and hadn't studied abroad. To show his worth, the university gave him an honorary Doctor of Science degree in 1921.

In 1924, he was chosen as a Fellow of the Royal Society, a very high honor for scientists. He told his mentor that his next goal was the Nobel Prize. In 1926, he started the Indian Journal of Physics and was its first editor. This journal later published his famous paper about the "Raman effect."

In 1933, Raman became the first Indian director of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bangalore. He started the Indian Academy of Sciences in 1934. He also helped start a chemical company in 1943. In 1947, after India became independent, he was named the first National Professor.

Raman left IISc in 1948 and opened the Raman Research Institute in Bangalore a year later. He led this institute and worked there until he died in 1970.

Science Discoveries

Musical Sounds

Raman was very interested in the science behind musical sounds. He studied how different instruments, like violins and Indian drums (like the tabla and mridangam), make their unique sounds. He even studied how sound travels in the famous Whispering Gallery of St Paul's Cathedral in London. His work on sound helped him later with his studies on light.

Blue Color of the Sea

In 1921, while sailing home from England, Raman wondered why the Mediterranean Sea was blue. People thought the sea's blue color was just a reflection of the sky. But Raman used simple tools, like a small spectroscope and a special prism, to look at the seawater. He saw that the sea looked even bluer when he used the prism to block out reflected sunlight. This showed that the water itself was blue, not just reflecting the sky.

He quickly wrote an article about his findings. Later, his student K. R. Ramanathan did more experiments that proved Raman was right. We now know that water looks blue because it absorbs red and orange light, letting the blue light pass through.

Raman Effect

How it was Discovered

Raman's most important discovery was the "Raman effect." After studying why water was blue, he wanted to understand more about how light scatters. In 1923, his experiments showed that when sunlight passed through certain liquids and solids, new light rays were formed. His student K. S. Krishnan also noticed this "feeble fluorescence" in 1925.

A big push for their work came from the discovery of the Compton effect in 1923. This showed that light could act like tiny particles. Raman and his team were inspired by this idea.

The Experiments

In January 1928, Krishnan started experiments. He found that any pure liquid would produce a special kind of light when a strong light was shined through it. Raman was surprised he hadn't seen this before. They called this new light "modified scattering."

On 28 February 1928, they finally got clear measurements of this new light, separate from the original light. Raman had invented a special spectrograph to do this. He famously said that his equipment for this Nobel Prize-winning discovery cost very little money. With this new tool, they could shine a single color of light through a material and see the new colors that appeared.

The Big News

Raman announced his discovery to the press on the same day, 28 February 1928. Newspapers quickly reported it as "New theory of radiation: Prof. Raman's Discovery." He sent a report to the science journal Nature, and then gave a detailed presentation in Bangalore on 16 March. He sent a thousand copies of his paper to scientists around the world.

Later Work

Raman also studied other things. He worked on how X-rays affect crystals and how light interacts with sound waves. He studied the structure and properties of diamonds for many years. He also looked at how different materials, like opal and pearl, show beautiful colors. Later in his life, he became interested in the colors of flowers and how human eyes see colors.

Personal Life

Raman married Lokasundari Ammal in 1907 when she was 13. She joked that their marriage was partly because married government officers got extra money! They had two sons, Chandrasekhar Raman and Venkatraman Radhakrishnan, who became a famous astronomer. Raman was also the uncle of Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, who won a Nobel Prize in Physics in 1983.

Raman loved collecting stones, minerals, and other materials that scattered light in interesting ways. He often carried a small spectroscope to study them. These items are now on display at IISc.

Lord Rutherford, a famous scientist, helped Raman a lot. He nominated Raman for the Nobel Prize and recommended him to be the director of IISc.

Raman was very confident about winning the Nobel Prize. In 1930, he booked tickets for himself and his wife to travel to Stockholm in July, even before the Nobel Committee announced the winners in November! He knew he would win.

Raman didn't talk much about religion, but he believed in the "Spirit of Man." He didn't like many traditional rituals, but he still followed some family customs. He often wore a traditional Indian turban, saying it helped him stay humble.

His Last Days

In October 1970, Raman had a heart attack in his lab. Doctors thought he wouldn't live long, but he survived for a few more days. He asked to stay in the gardens of his institute, surrounded by his students.

Two days before he died, he told a student, "Do not allow the journals of the Academy to die." He believed these journals showed how good science was in India. He also asked for a simple cremation without any rituals. He passed away peacefully on 21 November 1970, at age 82.

Awards and Honors

Raman received many awards and was part of many science groups around the world.

Awards

• In 1912, he received the Curzon Research Award.
• In 1913, he received the Woodburn Research Medal.
• In 1928, he received the Matteucci Medal from Italy.
• In 1930, he was made a Knight by the British King, so he was called "Sir C. V. Raman."
• In 1930, he won the Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the Raman effect. He was the first Asian and first non-white person to win a science Nobel Prize.
• In 1930, he received the Hughes Medal from the Royal Society.
• In 1941, he was awarded the Franklin Medal from the United States.
• In 1954, he received the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian award.
• In 1957, he was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize.

Images for kids

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  This diagram shows how light energy changes during the Raman effect.

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  Raman (left) at the Nobel Prize ceremony in 1930 with other winners.

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  An early graph of the Raman spectrum of benzene, published by Raman and Krishnan.

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  A statue of C. V. Raman at the Birla Industrial & Technological Museum.