Chandrasekhar was a voracious reader and had read everything from Shakespeare to Thomas Hardy. His reading speed was up to a 100 pages in an hour. This speed helped him to keep up with the current scientific journals while he was in college and understand the research that was going on in the laboratories across the world. While he was studying at Presidency College, Arnold Sommerfield gave a lecture on the exciting new developments in physics. Chandrasekhar was the only individual in that audience who followed every word that the great master uttered. After the lecture, Chandrasekhar had a very useful discussion with Sommerfield.

Later, after his degree, Chandrasekhar went to Trinity College at Cambridge University. During his time at Trinity, he presented two papers to the Royal Astronomical Society. One of these presentations dealt with the theory of white dwarf stars and how the quantum mechanical properties of the electron dictate the behaviour of these stars at the end of their life cycle. Chandrasekhar’s colleague Sir Arthur Eddington followed this paper with a presentation that was very critical of Chandrasekhar’s results. This attack was a severe blow to Chandrasekhar and left a lifelong impression on him. As a result of the disagreement, Chandrasekhar accepted a position as a research associate at the University of Chicago offered to him by the famous American astronomer Otto Struve. Chandrasekhar stayed at the University of Chicago throughout his career.

Chandrasekhar’s most famous success was the astrophysical Chandrasekhar limit. He calculated this limit while travelling by ship from India to England. The limit describes the maximum mass (~1.44 solar masses) of a white dwarf star, or the minimum mass which has to be surpassed for a star to collapse into a neutron star or black hole.

In 1947, two of Chandrasekhar’s students were the doctoral candidates Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen Ning Yang from China. Even though he maintained his office at the Yerkes Observatory in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, Chandrasekhar would regularly drive 100 miles to Chicago to teach Lee and Yang. In 1957, these two students won the Nobel Prize in physics for their work in particle physics research. This shows Chandrasekhar’s dedication and commitment to his students.

Inventions and discoveries have emanated from creative minds that have been constantly working and imagining outcomes. With imagination and ceaseless effort, all the forces of the universe must work for that inspired mind, thereby leading to inventions and discoveries. I am sure all of you will take this message and apply it in your respective fields, leading you to make inventions and discoveries needed for societal upliftment regardless of failure.

A Letter to You

Excerpt from a letter, 10 Rajaji Marg, New Delhi

18 March 2010

I have one piece of advice for students based on my own experience of writing various examinations. I wrote five important exams in my educational period—ESLC (eighth standard), SSLC (tenth standard), Intermediate (twelfth standard), BSc and DMIT (aeronautical engineering). Most of the time, the outcome was not as per my expectations. I had to even lose one year due to a paper leakage. I am saying this to bring to your mind the idea that exams and exam results are not the ultimate goal in life. If you don’t perform properly the first time, you can always rewrite the examination and succeed.