5 Quotes & Sayings By Subrahmanijan Chandrasekhar

Subrahmaniam Chandrasekhar was an Indian astrophysicist and Nobel laureate in physics in 1995 "for the discovery of the chandrasekhar limit" relating to the evolutionary collapse of stars. Chandrasekhar is widely regarded as the greatest astrophysicist of his generation and he ranks among the greatest in all history. He was a pioneer in the development of supernovae theory and white dwarf theory. His work on stellar evolution culminated with the Chandrasekhar limit, named after him, which relates the maximum mass a star can have before it undergoes gravitational collapse. He also applied his theoretical work to problems such as the stability of spacecraft and led private scientific expeditions into space to develop techniques for studying outer space. He served as a professor at University of Chicago and Princeton University Read more

He has been called "the father of modern astrophysics" and "the greatest astrophysicist since Isaac Newton." The asteroid (10474) Chandrasekhar is named after him, as is one of the largest black holes, (the black hole at centre) at center) Cyg X-1, which is located near its X-ray source (Chandra X-ray Observatory). The Chandra X-ray Observatory, formerly known as Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF), was renamed in his honor on September 15, 2004. A crater on Mercury has also been named after him.

He received numerous awards for his scientific work including Padma Bhushan (1962), Copley Medal (1970), Bhatnagar Prize (1971), Hughes Medal (1983), King Faisal International Prize for Science and Technology (1993), Honorary Doctorate from Harvard University (1994)

1
The pursuit of science has often been compared to the scaling of mountains, high and not so high. But who amongst us can hope, even in imagination, to scale the Everest and reach its summit when the sky is blue and the air is still, and in the stillness of the air survey the entire Himalayan range in the dazzling white of the snow stretching to infinity? None of us can hope for a comparable vision of nature and of the universe around us. But there is nothing mean or lowly in standing in the valley below and awaiting the sun to rise over Kinchinjunga. Subrahmanijan Chandrasekhar
2
I am not religious in any sense; in fact, I consider myself an atheist. Subrahmanijan Chandrasekhar
3
In some strange way, any new fact or insight that I may have found has not seemed to me as a “discovery” of mine, but rather something that had always been there and that I had chanced to pick up. Subrahmanijan Chandrasekhar
4
I should like to preface my remarks with a personal statement in order that my later remarks will not be misunderstood. I consider myself an atheist. Subrahmanijan Chandrasekhar