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Venkatraman Radhakrishnan (18 May 1929 – 3 March 2011) was an internationally renowned space scientist and member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. He was Professor Emeritus of the Raman Research Institute in Bangalore, India, where he had been Director from 1972 to 1994. Professor Radhakrishnan was born in Tondaripet, a suburb of Madras to Nobel laureate physicist Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman and his wife Lokasundari Ammal . His earlier schooling was in Madras. He graduated from the Mysore University before joining the Department of Physics at the prestigious Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. He was married to Mrs. Francoise-Dominique Radhakrishnan . They have a son Vivek Radhakrishnan who studied design under the direction of Hella Jongerius, from the Design Academy Eindhoven, Netherlands. In 2004, Vivek and his wife Namrata returned home to Bangalore to set up Kynkyny. The company has two facets, Kynkyny Art, a gallery for contemporary Indian art, and Kynkyny Home, a boutique for exclusive home furniture and products. Prof. Radhakrishnan served on various committees in various capacities. He was the Vice President of the International Astronomical Union during 1988-1994. He served as the Chairman of Commission J ( Radio Astronomy) of the International Union of Radio Sciences (1981–1984). Radhakrishnan was one of the most respected Radio Astronomers in the world during his time, in that he was associated in one capacity or other with the world’s biggest radio telescopes. He was the member of the Foreign Advisory Committee for the Netherlands Foundation for Radio Astronomy, Steering Committee of the Australia Telescope National Facility, CSIRO, Australia, Advisory Committee for the Green Bank Radio Telescope, National Radio Astronomy Observatory, USA He was also the Member of the Governing Council of the Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad and the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics. During the period of 1973–1981 he was a member of the Indian National Committee for Astronomy. Radhakrishnan was selected to various scientific bodies, both national and international. He was a Foreign Fellow of both the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the U.S. National Science Academy. He was an Associate of the Royal Astronomical Society and a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore He was an internationally acclaimed Astrophysicist and also renowned for his design and fabrication of ultralight aircraft and sailboats. Prof. V. Radhakrishnan had received his B.Sc.(Hon) from Mysore University. He started his research career as a research scholar at the Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science Bangalore and thereafter was in the research faculties of various world famous institutes. He worked in the Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden as a Research Assistant during 1955-58. He was a Senior Research fellow of the California Institute of Technology, USA before joining the Radiophysics Division of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Sydney, Australia initially as the Senior Research Scientist and later as the Principal Research Scientist. He returned to India in 1972 and took up the task of rebuilding the Raman Research Institute as its Director. During his tenure as the Director of the Raman Research Institute between 1972–1994 he built up an international reputation for work in the areas of pulsar astronomy, liquid crystals and other areas of frontline research in Astronomy. The University of Amsterdam conferred the most prestigious Doctor Honoris Causa degree on Prof. Radhakrishnan in 1996. ==Areas of Research== V. Radhakrishnan had been associated with the field of radio astronomy practically from the beginning of its phenomenal post- World War II growth in the 1950s. He was one of the persons who founded the science of observational astronomy in India. His career had been truly international, starting in Sweden in 1954 and proceeding via CalTech and CSIRO, Sydney to Bangalore where he spent the last thirty three years. Starting with the electronics of receivers, he moved on to technically innovative and astronomically far-reaching studies of the polarization of the radio waves. These include the detection of radio waves from the Van Allen like belts surrounding Jupiter and the first determination of the true rotation of the core of Jupiter. He was also the first in systematic application of interferometry to polarized brightness distributions and an early study of the Zeeman Effect in the 21 cm line emitted by a hydrogen atom.〔Zeeman Splitting of the 21-cm Absorption Line in Orion A () '', NASA ADS''〕 His measurements of polarization of Vela Pulsar were decisive in establishing the picture of a magnetized rotating neutron star and led him to propose the paradigm of curvature radiation from polar caps of neutron stars which has dominated the subject of pulsar emission mechanisms since that time. The period of his stay in Australia also marked his leadership of an extensive survey of the absorption and emission of 21 cm line radiation by neutral hydrogen which later helped to develop the realistic model of the interstellar medium. He also carried out systematic interferometric study of 21 cm absorption towards a large number of galactic and extragalactic sources. His detailed observational and theoretical work on different aspects of pulsars is truly pioneering in the field of Pulsar Astronomy. According to his colleagues in different international institutes, each world-renowned for their contributions in the field of astronomy & astrophysics, although Prof. Radhakrishnan has a number of important discoveries to his credit, his main impact on astronomy had been in his effect in other people’s research through discussion of the astronomical and technical problems and practical assistance with the later. He was one of the most devoted and perceptive physicists only satisfied with deep understanding of any concept and his interest increases with the strangeness or significance of the phenomenon. He was uninterested in mundane repetitions of other people’s work and searches for new breakthroughs. It was not only in the field of astronomy that Prof. Radhakrishnan kept his mark but also in the designing and fabricating hang-gliders, micro-light aircraft and sailboats. His original contributions in these fields were acknowledged by the Government of India by way of support from the Aeronautics Research Development Board, Ministry of Defence (for designing hang-gliders) and ISRO (for sailboats). 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Venkatraman Radhakrishnan」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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