We all have been subjected to this all important question at some point or the other, whether we intend to go back to India after "finishing" our studies. Some answered honestly, some gave more of a politically correct answer. Some said they do not know. But as it was a purely speculative question at that point, and none had to give a "final" answer, so what we said did not really carry a whole lot of weight. We knew we will cross the bridge when it came to that, unless of course we were pushed out into the water.
Undoubtedly that has happened to people. Some lost funding, some did not clear their qualifying examinations, some had personal issues and had to go back. I am not talking about those forced departures. Suddenly I am seeing a lot of my contemporaries from India, doing well in US or Europe in academics, deciding to go back in their free will, often abandoning their current positions. I also have examples of my family members or other senior folks who went back, again mostly in their own accord. Is there a generation-independent common thread in these homecomings, or individuals just acted according to their own personal situations?
The one underlying thread is always taking care of family. None of our parents are getting younger, and being in the same timezone rather than a long flight or two away is certainly more comforting. It is also true that for some, industry jobs in India are as good as what they would have gotten over here, minus the hassles of visa, green card and immigration lawyers. But for people looking at academic positions, is India equally tempting? Or is it not about career, but more about security? Priorities changed, or it never was about loving the work?
Career is always a very selfish pursuit, and uncertain too. In spite of working our backside off, while ignoring social obligations and family responsibilities, there is no assurance that we will ever get a permanent academic position in US (or in Europe, for that matter) which we will like. Specially for those of us in fields, where supply far outweighs the demand, we spend years as "postdocs" before even thinking about permanent positions. That is essentially like waiting in a queue, without knowing what it is at the end. So after unsuccessfully exploring all possibilities, if you still like what you did all these while (and realize that you not really good for anything else!), and going back gives you an opportunity to continue in academics, albeit in a slightly more frustrating setup, it does make perfect sense. The money is not so bad either nowadays.
However, many are going back much earlier. Yes, there is a glut of faculty positions in India now, after all these new institutes were created, but did we work hard all these while just for a safe job? We survived hard deadlines and meager graduate student salaries, not because we knew there is a job waiting, but because we enjoyed what we were doing. Few do research which changes the world or wins Nobel prize, but just being a small cog in a big wheel is no less motivating. And truth be told, the academic ambiance in a random American university is usually better than that in a random Indian university. Research is more streamlined, there is less political interference in everyday matters, and the professors are more respected in the society. Without exploring that option, and actually comparing if staying back can be better for a career in research, bolting for a safe job appears a bland cop out to me.
Now of course there is the other stream of thought that, it is obligatory for homegrown Indians to go back. A foreign country can never feel like home, and one should not spend one's life abroad, uprooted from the familiar surroundings, and not getting fully integrated there. This may have some merit, but in that case, it would rule out most of India for me. I would feel more of a stranger in Chennai without knowing any Tamil rather than how much I feel alienated in US, where I even though I cant speak like them, I can understand what they speak. Another school of thought goes that since our education in India was essentially subsidized by tax payers money, we owe it to take our skills back. Without going into a long argument on whether higher education should be free, I would say that knowledge transfer in today's connected world does not necessarily require continuous physical presence.
I do know if I will get an academic job here. I do not know if I would like one a few years down the line. I do not know if in that case I prefer going back and get an academic job there. What I do know is this, that whatever I do, it will be driven only by career aspirations at that point, making sure I enjoy doing that. That has always been the primary motivation, and abandoning that will make all these years meaningless.
Showing posts with label Physics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Physics. Show all posts
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Friday, November 12, 2010
Looking back at the choice I made
Disclaimer: this was written as a response to a question from a very good friend, if this reads too trivial and personal. may be it is. Also, no disrespect meant to any one making any career choice, the opinions expressed reflect my personal bias.
Why are you doing what are you doing? I guess this is one of the most frequently asked question to those of us who are considered not doing a "real job". While I discussed about why I love doing what I am doing years back here, the other question would be, how did I end up doing it. My usual answer is that I ended up doing physics because I was not good at anything else, which strangely does not satisfy people at all.
One tends to think that career choice is a huge decision. May be it is, but as a teenager, it is hard to have that broad global perspective. Our decisions are mostly shaped by what we see happening all around us, in a very local scale. Although in high school essays one writes one wants to be a doctor when one grows up because they hate to see poor people suffering, I have a sneaky feeling that they want to be doctors either because the white coat looks cool in movies, or after reading Robin Cook novels.
I grew up in a very liberal (my parents spent considerable time abroad) yet conservative (in the sense that choosing a non-traditional career was not an option) household in the outskirts of a small town. We were not strikingly affluent, but all the basic luxuries were all there, and fortunately money was never something which influenced my career path. Like all the nerdy kids, I liked mathematics and sciences, but I also found history entertaining and geography enchanting. It is remarkably satisfying when you actually get to set foot on the places you read years back in those books, but I digress. I have to admit that while I liked reading books, of all colors and flavors, I could never find much logic in studying literature, which essentially involved critically dissecting the nice pieces and taking the fun out of them, or memorizing rules of grammar, which is merely a human convention.
My dad is a Ph.D physicist, and so were a few other uncles. My mom studied history. So that possibly helped to shape my initial interest. However, as I approached that inevitable point where I had to decide my "future", there were few other considerations too. Bright (and not so bright) kids left and right were desperately studying engineering in the hope of landing an "easy" software job, and at that impressionable age, that sounded tempting enough. In fact the accepted convention in those days was that the best minds study engineering and medicine, leaving the mediocre kids who could not get through to either study science and humanities subjects. I was fortunate to have been acquainted with computers from an early age, so with my limited (but certainly better than others who wanted to study computer engineering without having the faintest idea of what it is) exposure, I thought that may be a fun subject. But then I was told that you get to use computers in a lot of other disciplines too, and I was happy. Plus studying computers at a good place involved going through some pretty competitive, demanding but dull entrance examinations, and I was not sure if it was worth the hassle. (For the record, yes, I did take those exams, and yes did not get through to where I would have wanted, but at that point I already had my mind made up.)
It is hard to pin down a moment when and how I made up my mind to study physics, but I will try. Many people think, somewhat mistakenly, that I ended up choosing physics because of my family influence. While it is certainly true that there are/were some highly talented and acclaimed physicists I got to talk to, and my dad is an amazing teacher, something so easily accessible and "everyday" does not influence you so much. May be it did subconsciously, I do not know. However, a couple of things happened the summer before I had to decide. I ended up in a summer camp kind of thing (organized by the excellent people at JBNSTS), where toppers from different schools in North Bengal and North-East India gathered and we had short courses on advanced topics. The professor who taught physics, more specifically very beginning quantum mechanics to these bunch of starry-eyed kids was superbly motivational, and we were mesmerized. The class would start in the lecture hall in the afternoon, and at some point, when the lecture hall needed to be locked up, we would just shift to the adjacent cafeteria, and he would continue. Most of us fell in love with physics. Practical considerations meant not all of us taking up physics, but even now when I talk with someone from that group, they fondly talk reminiscence about those lectures. Around the same time, I happened to stumble on this book by James Gleick based on life of Feynman and I just could not put it down. I read though it, all five hundred plus ages in one go, and that was it. As an adolescent you need someone to idolize (Bill Gates for my computer science friends perhaps?), and no matter how cliched it sounds, he was that man. Of course other mundane things helped, that I actually did not get through to those engineering colleges where a lot of people around me expected me to go, but I had good enough grades to get through to perhaps one of the best undergraduate program in physics at that time, and incidentally the aforementioned quantum mechanics
teacher was a faculty there.
As a very young kid, I had a fascination for trains, like all kids do. Once a train driver waived back at me, and that made my day. I thought I wanted a to be train driver. Alas, that never worked out, but as a high energy physicist, I am going places afterall!
Why are you doing what are you doing? I guess this is one of the most frequently asked question to those of us who are considered not doing a "real job". While I discussed about why I love doing what I am doing years back here, the other question would be, how did I end up doing it. My usual answer is that I ended up doing physics because I was not good at anything else, which strangely does not satisfy people at all.
One tends to think that career choice is a huge decision. May be it is, but as a teenager, it is hard to have that broad global perspective. Our decisions are mostly shaped by what we see happening all around us, in a very local scale. Although in high school essays one writes one wants to be a doctor when one grows up because they hate to see poor people suffering, I have a sneaky feeling that they want to be doctors either because the white coat looks cool in movies, or after reading Robin Cook novels.
I grew up in a very liberal (my parents spent considerable time abroad) yet conservative (in the sense that choosing a non-traditional career was not an option) household in the outskirts of a small town. We were not strikingly affluent, but all the basic luxuries were all there, and fortunately money was never something which influenced my career path. Like all the nerdy kids, I liked mathematics and sciences, but I also found history entertaining and geography enchanting. It is remarkably satisfying when you actually get to set foot on the places you read years back in those books, but I digress. I have to admit that while I liked reading books, of all colors and flavors, I could never find much logic in studying literature, which essentially involved critically dissecting the nice pieces and taking the fun out of them, or memorizing rules of grammar, which is merely a human convention.
My dad is a Ph.D physicist, and so were a few other uncles. My mom studied history. So that possibly helped to shape my initial interest. However, as I approached that inevitable point where I had to decide my "future", there were few other considerations too. Bright (and not so bright) kids left and right were desperately studying engineering in the hope of landing an "easy" software job, and at that impressionable age, that sounded tempting enough. In fact the accepted convention in those days was that the best minds study engineering and medicine, leaving the mediocre kids who could not get through to either study science and humanities subjects. I was fortunate to have been acquainted with computers from an early age, so with my limited (but certainly better than others who wanted to study computer engineering without having the faintest idea of what it is) exposure, I thought that may be a fun subject. But then I was told that you get to use computers in a lot of other disciplines too, and I was happy. Plus studying computers at a good place involved going through some pretty competitive, demanding but dull entrance examinations, and I was not sure if it was worth the hassle. (For the record, yes, I did take those exams, and yes did not get through to where I would have wanted, but at that point I already had my mind made up.)
It is hard to pin down a moment when and how I made up my mind to study physics, but I will try. Many people think, somewhat mistakenly, that I ended up choosing physics because of my family influence. While it is certainly true that there are/were some highly talented and acclaimed physicists I got to talk to, and my dad is an amazing teacher, something so easily accessible and "everyday" does not influence you so much. May be it did subconsciously, I do not know. However, a couple of things happened the summer before I had to decide. I ended up in a summer camp kind of thing (organized by the excellent people at JBNSTS), where toppers from different schools in North Bengal and North-East India gathered and we had short courses on advanced topics. The professor who taught physics, more specifically very beginning quantum mechanics to these bunch of starry-eyed kids was superbly motivational, and we were mesmerized. The class would start in the lecture hall in the afternoon, and at some point, when the lecture hall needed to be locked up, we would just shift to the adjacent cafeteria, and he would continue. Most of us fell in love with physics. Practical considerations meant not all of us taking up physics, but even now when I talk with someone from that group, they fondly talk reminiscence about those lectures. Around the same time, I happened to stumble on this book by James Gleick based on life of Feynman and I just could not put it down. I read though it, all five hundred plus ages in one go, and that was it. As an adolescent you need someone to idolize (Bill Gates for my computer science friends perhaps?), and no matter how cliched it sounds, he was that man. Of course other mundane things helped, that I actually did not get through to those engineering colleges where a lot of people around me expected me to go, but I had good enough grades to get through to perhaps one of the best undergraduate program in physics at that time, and incidentally the aforementioned quantum mechanics
teacher was a faculty there.
As a very young kid, I had a fascination for trains, like all kids do. Once a train driver waived back at me, and that made my day. I thought I wanted a to be train driver. Alas, that never worked out, but as a high energy physicist, I am going places afterall!
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Reflections
Time indeed flies fast. I still vividly remember the 2003 fall evening I landed up in this little big campus town. Fresh into an alien land, adjusting to a new culture, so far away from my friends and family, with my awkward accent, it sure was a challenge.
Physics was not the only thing I learnt over the next five or so years. Staying up late in first few semesters, working on those lengthy homework assignments, taught me that that a lot of physics would be drudge work, training for the future. Research has been much more fun, although I realized it is almost impossible to make that ground breaking fundamental contribution, which we all dreamt about when we first decided to do physics, ignoring the temptation and allure of engineering and potentially big money . It has turned out that most of us are rather like cogs in a big wheel, making small (and hopefully somewhat significant) contributions to the big cluttered landscape. But I have also concluded that, this is what I want to do,
and by some fantastic coincidence, the next few years would be incredibly exciting time in our field.
Gainesville has definitely grown on me in all these years. People have been amazingly nice and kind. Once I left my passport in the department, the day before going on a month long India trip. Darlene Latimer and Chris Scanlon came all the way from their home on a Friday night to retrieve it, so that I did not have to miss the trip.
I have lived through what probably has been the golden era of Gator sports. I have first time voted and actively participated in a landmark presidential election. I have traveled all across the country (so far been to 35 states) and beyond, both for academic and pleasure trips. Now, driving up on I-75, when I see that little green sign saying Gainesville is near, it feels like I am about to be home.
And, after this wonderful journey, I would be moving across the Atlantic to Germany for my postdoctoral work. To a new country, without knowing the language, away from all the wonderful friends I made here. Déjà vu?
Published in UF Physics monthly newsletter, Proton, with a five year old mugshot of mine!
Physics was not the only thing I learnt over the next five or so years. Staying up late in first few semesters, working on those lengthy homework assignments, taught me that that a lot of physics would be drudge work, training for the future. Research has been much more fun, although I realized it is almost impossible to make that ground breaking fundamental contribution, which we all dreamt about when we first decided to do physics, ignoring the temptation and allure of engineering and potentially big money . It has turned out that most of us are rather like cogs in a big wheel, making small (and hopefully somewhat significant) contributions to the big cluttered landscape. But I have also concluded that, this is what I want to do,
and by some fantastic coincidence, the next few years would be incredibly exciting time in our field.
Gainesville has definitely grown on me in all these years. People have been amazingly nice and kind. Once I left my passport in the department, the day before going on a month long India trip. Darlene Latimer and Chris Scanlon came all the way from their home on a Friday night to retrieve it, so that I did not have to miss the trip.
I have lived through what probably has been the golden era of Gator sports. I have first time voted and actively participated in a landmark presidential election. I have traveled all across the country (so far been to 35 states) and beyond, both for academic and pleasure trips. Now, driving up on I-75, when I see that little green sign saying Gainesville is near, it feels like I am about to be home.
And, after this wonderful journey, I would be moving across the Atlantic to Germany for my postdoctoral work. To a new country, without knowing the language, away from all the wonderful friends I made here. Déjà vu?
Published in UF Physics monthly newsletter, Proton, with a five year old mugshot of mine!
Sunday, March 09, 2008
Judging a Science Fair
This was something I had never done before. Never as a kid I built one of those toy models and never as an adult I cared to look carefully at them. A week or so ago, I had the opportunity to judge the Alachua County Science and Engineering Fair, where kids from local middle and high schools put of their projects. On stake was invites to the state fair - and it was amazing to see the amount of effort and enthusiasm those kids (and in most cases their parents or teachers) put in.
The day started off with me looking at some of the "Physics" projects - and they ranged from super methodical to interesting to downright stupid. The winner in this category had toy cars of different shapes and sizes in a homemade wind tunnel and looked at those affect the wind flow. It was a pretty neat idea, although not the most conclusive way of looking at that particular problem. Another girl measured how high a dry and wet soccer ball would jump with varying amount of air pressure - again not terribly innovative, but one has to give it to them for the effort. On the other side there were projects where one kid after a lot of measurements concluded that dark colored liquids absorb more light than light colored - oh well, is not that what "dark" exactly means? Then there were politically correct projects, where this guy basically hooked up his dad's generator with some load and ran it till it exhausted 5 gallons of petroleum with different octane ratings and concluded which variety is more economical.
After lunch, it was time to branch out to different areas - and I came across some of really eye catching, albeit useless projects. One involved making a dog smell different foodstuff and record how it reacted. Another one played different sound tracks to a chicken and saw which one got it scared. There was one project where a guy poured different brands of carbonated soft drinks on animal tissue, and predicted comparatively how harmful they are depending on how much the tissue is dissolved. Only one problem though - it also got dissolved in distilled water.
I did not have to judge those though. I was pretty impressed by this project where a photo sensor, depending upon how green the leaves are, automatically started watering the plant. I was not at all impressed where they tested different fishing lines strength - how much weight it can support before they break, and they had no clue how all that would change inside water. I am no expert on fishing, but I always thought there must be some water involved, right?
Many of the projects, across the disciplines, involved comparing commercial products. How long different brands of candles burn, how strong different sunscreen or detergents are or how different cameras reproduce the color spectrum. While these are interesting, I am not fully sure if I would call them projects in the sense of term.
Overshadowing most of those, was this 8th grader, explaining how she made silver nanoparticles and looked at their properties. Wow. I am not sure if I can pull that off even now!
The day started off with me looking at some of the "Physics" projects - and they ranged from super methodical to interesting to downright stupid. The winner in this category had toy cars of different shapes and sizes in a homemade wind tunnel and looked at those affect the wind flow. It was a pretty neat idea, although not the most conclusive way of looking at that particular problem. Another girl measured how high a dry and wet soccer ball would jump with varying amount of air pressure - again not terribly innovative, but one has to give it to them for the effort. On the other side there were projects where one kid after a lot of measurements concluded that dark colored liquids absorb more light than light colored - oh well, is not that what "dark" exactly means? Then there were politically correct projects, where this guy basically hooked up his dad's generator with some load and ran it till it exhausted 5 gallons of petroleum with different octane ratings and concluded which variety is more economical.
After lunch, it was time to branch out to different areas - and I came across some of really eye catching, albeit useless projects. One involved making a dog smell different foodstuff and record how it reacted. Another one played different sound tracks to a chicken and saw which one got it scared. There was one project where a guy poured different brands of carbonated soft drinks on animal tissue, and predicted comparatively how harmful they are depending on how much the tissue is dissolved. Only one problem though - it also got dissolved in distilled water.
I did not have to judge those though. I was pretty impressed by this project where a photo sensor, depending upon how green the leaves are, automatically started watering the plant. I was not at all impressed where they tested different fishing lines strength - how much weight it can support before they break, and they had no clue how all that would change inside water. I am no expert on fishing, but I always thought there must be some water involved, right?
Many of the projects, across the disciplines, involved comparing commercial products. How long different brands of candles burn, how strong different sunscreen or detergents are or how different cameras reproduce the color spectrum. While these are interesting, I am not fully sure if I would call them projects in the sense of term.
Overshadowing most of those, was this 8th grader, explaining how she made silver nanoparticles and looked at their properties. Wow. I am not sure if I can pull that off even now!
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Different Physics-views!
I still remember that day. There was this conference organized by our department at Jadavpur University and it featured talks by some big name Physicists, none perhaps more famous than Ashoke Sen. We were in our undergraduate days then - all dreamy eyed budding Physicists, and of course we attended all the talks, no matter how much we got out from them. And then we got hold of the famous man himself, asking him mostly naive and inane questions, which he patiently answered. Then we wanted a group photo taken with him - he was slightly embarrassed, but still obliged. That made our day - and for a long time that remained, and perhaps still remains a prized snap for us.
Kolkata Physics was mostly like that - all sweet, no sweat. At least for us. The only method of solving problems was to stare at them for a while and then writing out the solution - working out pages full of algebra was not "elegant". We honestly believed that every problem should have a simple and intelligent solution - others are not worth bothering about. The best way of doing Physics labs was to do the experiments without touching the apparatus once. And picking and choosing what we think we should read. Quantum Mechanics and Special Theory of Relativity were exciting - Optics and Acoustics were not. Electronics was simply not Physics, and instrumentation was below our dignity to talk about. Any self respecting Physicists should work on Theory - at least we all wanted to. Well, may be all that is a slight exaggeration - but one gets the picture. Physics was supposed to be elegant and big Physicists to be worshiped.
It did not take long after coming to United States to realize that attitude would not really work. While real Physics still may be beautiful and aesthetically pleasing, to reach there one has to do a lot of dirty work. Working and reworking through obnoxiously long and ugly calculations and learning stuff which have very little Physics in them. And somewhere in the process - we lost that respect for the big and famous. Its not that I would not appreciate someone who is a great teacher or gotten some good results - but they would still remain mere mortals, as fallible as the guy next door, when they are not talking about Physics. I would not go to a colloquium just because some big name Physicist is talking, unless I have some amount of interest in what he is talking about. I would not go and talk to him just because he is so and so, unless I actually have something worthwhile to discuss.
I do not want to make a value judgement here. This summer, when I was in CERN, there was this bright kid from my undergraduate school, and he is working for his Ph.D over there in India. And I was almost feeling nostalgic - looking at him getting overwhelmed by the big shots - clicking photos, dying to talk to them, hanging onto every word they said. I could see how we did the same thing years back - and I could also see how we have cultivated this attitude of casual irreverence. The sense of wonder is still there - but it has been mostly replaced by what for the lack of a better word I would call professionalism. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Is that what "America" did to me or was bound to happen anyway? I do not know.
Kolkata Physics was mostly like that - all sweet, no sweat. At least for us. The only method of solving problems was to stare at them for a while and then writing out the solution - working out pages full of algebra was not "elegant". We honestly believed that every problem should have a simple and intelligent solution - others are not worth bothering about. The best way of doing Physics labs was to do the experiments without touching the apparatus once. And picking and choosing what we think we should read. Quantum Mechanics and Special Theory of Relativity were exciting - Optics and Acoustics were not. Electronics was simply not Physics, and instrumentation was below our dignity to talk about. Any self respecting Physicists should work on Theory - at least we all wanted to. Well, may be all that is a slight exaggeration - but one gets the picture. Physics was supposed to be elegant and big Physicists to be worshiped.
It did not take long after coming to United States to realize that attitude would not really work. While real Physics still may be beautiful and aesthetically pleasing, to reach there one has to do a lot of dirty work. Working and reworking through obnoxiously long and ugly calculations and learning stuff which have very little Physics in them. And somewhere in the process - we lost that respect for the big and famous. Its not that I would not appreciate someone who is a great teacher or gotten some good results - but they would still remain mere mortals, as fallible as the guy next door, when they are not talking about Physics. I would not go to a colloquium just because some big name Physicist is talking, unless I have some amount of interest in what he is talking about. I would not go and talk to him just because he is so and so, unless I actually have something worthwhile to discuss.
I do not want to make a value judgement here. This summer, when I was in CERN, there was this bright kid from my undergraduate school, and he is working for his Ph.D over there in India. And I was almost feeling nostalgic - looking at him getting overwhelmed by the big shots - clicking photos, dying to talk to them, hanging onto every word they said. I could see how we did the same thing years back - and I could also see how we have cultivated this attitude of casual irreverence. The sense of wonder is still there - but it has been mostly replaced by what for the lack of a better word I would call professionalism. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Is that what "America" did to me or was bound to happen anyway? I do not know.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
"Physical" Traveling
There are not too many perks for a graduate student here. Traveling on academic purposes is one of those rare ones - and I am having an excellent summer by that yardstick. First was the now well documented Europe trip - and it was primarily a summer school in CERN. Within a couple of weeks after coming back, I rushed to Fermilab Chicago, for a presentation our internal collaboration group meeting. After spending the weekend in Chicago, and catching up with some old friends, now I am at Princeton, NJ for another summer school.
I have been here before. But now as a pseudo-insider, Princeton does look classy, and the Institute of Advanced Studies (made famous by Einstein, among others) classier. Among the speakers there are some really big names of the field, and its not too hard to see legends around. This is really isolated from the rest of the world though - nearest civilizations is half an hour walk away, with virtually non existent public transportation.
I have been here before. But now as a pseudo-insider, Princeton does look classy, and the Institute of Advanced Studies (made famous by Einstein, among others) classier. Among the speakers there are some really big names of the field, and its not too hard to see legends around. This is really isolated from the rest of the world though - nearest civilizations is half an hour walk away, with virtually non existent public transportation.
Monday, October 31, 2005
A "Physi-Cal" Adda!
Someone totally unconnected with Physics gave me this amazing link - where Prof. A.K. Raychaudhuri is interviewed by Parthasarathi Majumdar, Soumitra Sengupta and Jayanta K. Bhattacharjee.
Although I never had an opportunity to know Prof.Roychaudhuri personally - he inspired over a generation of Physicists from Kolkata - to say the least. There are many people who do good work - but beyond his research - he was an outstanding teacher in the sense of the term , according his students - which includes my father and uncle too - in my family. And this video was taken on July 2005 - just months before he passed away - makes it more special.
But to me - its more touching - because of the interviewers. Soumitra Sengupta , formerly of JU , now in IACS , is perhaps the reason why I came to Physics at the first place. Looking back at the summer of 1997 , still undecided about the career path - his inspiring lectures at JBNSTS summer school - which more often than not went beyond the scheduled hours - were one huge reason for me finally going in Physics. Then in spite of his busy schedule - we always had "SSG" as our mentor in JU days. Jayanta K. Bhattacharjee of IACS , much better known as "J.K.B" seemed to have an unofficial responsibilty of getting JU students started with some research in their undergrad years - and I was no exception. I must admit that due to other commitments - many times my effort did not live up to his expectations - but he was always so patient and encouraging - it was a real learning experience to work with him. Partha Majumder - of SINP , formerly of IMSc , had been a family friend - and he is an integral part of the Kolkata Physics circuit - but personally I did not have too many chances of interacting with him.
They called it an "interview" - but its more like an "adda" session. Adda is an integral part of Kolkata culture - and physicists are no exception. It was a nostalgic feeling for me to hear all those familiar voices discuss anything and everything - and somehow rekindles the focus for Physics again.
And before I forget - here is the link -
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7361442212004324371
Although I never had an opportunity to know Prof.Roychaudhuri personally - he inspired over a generation of Physicists from Kolkata - to say the least. There are many people who do good work - but beyond his research - he was an outstanding teacher in the sense of the term , according his students - which includes my father and uncle too - in my family. And this video was taken on July 2005 - just months before he passed away - makes it more special.
But to me - its more touching - because of the interviewers. Soumitra Sengupta , formerly of JU , now in IACS , is perhaps the reason why I came to Physics at the first place. Looking back at the summer of 1997 , still undecided about the career path - his inspiring lectures at JBNSTS summer school - which more often than not went beyond the scheduled hours - were one huge reason for me finally going in Physics. Then in spite of his busy schedule - we always had "SSG" as our mentor in JU days. Jayanta K. Bhattacharjee of IACS , much better known as "J.K.B" seemed to have an unofficial responsibilty of getting JU students started with some research in their undergrad years - and I was no exception. I must admit that due to other commitments - many times my effort did not live up to his expectations - but he was always so patient and encouraging - it was a real learning experience to work with him. Partha Majumder - of SINP , formerly of IMSc , had been a family friend - and he is an integral part of the Kolkata Physics circuit - but personally I did not have too many chances of interacting with him.
They called it an "interview" - but its more like an "adda" session. Adda is an integral part of Kolkata culture - and physicists are no exception. It was a nostalgic feeling for me to hear all those familiar voices discuss anything and everything - and somehow rekindles the focus for Physics again.
And before I forget - here is the link -
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7361442212004324371
Friday, October 14, 2005
So Near Yet So Far
Nobody knows if it was supposed to be that big. But somehow it turned out to be that. The most recognizable reward for a Physicist (or for an Economist and so on). Like any other subjective award - its often not fair - but that has not taken off the glitter a bit. The Swedish Prize as it colloquially referred to, is still the ultimate laurel in the field.
And amazingly - we almost had a winner this year. Like many of the illastrious Physics programs across the country - we dont have Nobel Laureates walking down the hallway - so this indeed means a lot to an emerging program like us. The Physics Nobel this year has been partially awarded to Roy Glauber from Harvard "for his contribution to the quantum theory of optical coherence.”. UF Physics and Mathematics Professor John Klauder helped to work out the mathematical theory of this phenomenon.
Part of the citation reads: “The mathematical formalism of quantized fields was developed in parallel with Glauber’s work on their applications. E.C.G. Sudarshan drew attention to the use of coherent state representations for the approach to classical physics; at this point he refers to Glauber’s work. Together with J.R. Klauder he proceeded to develop the mathematical formalism of Quantum Optics; their approach is presented in their textbook. After the initial contributions, many authors applied Glauber’s results to the rapidly evolving experimental situation in optical physics, thus creating the field today called ‘Quantum Optics’.”
We felt that Klauder deserved more than just a mention - afterall Glauber used and extended his formalism of Coherent States in Quantum Optics. But alas that did not happen. And we still await a Nobel Prize winner from UF Physics.
And amazingly - we almost had a winner this year. Like many of the illastrious Physics programs across the country - we dont have Nobel Laureates walking down the hallway - so this indeed means a lot to an emerging program like us. The Physics Nobel this year has been partially awarded to Roy Glauber from Harvard "for his contribution to the quantum theory of optical coherence.”. UF Physics and Mathematics Professor John Klauder helped to work out the mathematical theory of this phenomenon.
Part of the citation reads: “The mathematical formalism of quantized fields was developed in parallel with Glauber’s work on their applications. E.C.G. Sudarshan drew attention to the use of coherent state representations for the approach to classical physics; at this point he refers to Glauber’s work. Together with J.R. Klauder he proceeded to develop the mathematical formalism of Quantum Optics; their approach is presented in their textbook. After the initial contributions, many authors applied Glauber’s results to the rapidly evolving experimental situation in optical physics, thus creating the field today called ‘Quantum Optics’.”
We felt that Klauder deserved more than just a mention - afterall Glauber used and extended his formalism of Coherent States in Quantum Optics. But alas that did not happen. And we still await a Nobel Prize winner from UF Physics.
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
Why do you do it?
In my brief career in Theoretical Physics (Okay,what I am doing is more of Computational than purely Theoretical - but that doesn't change what I am going to talk about) I have to face this question again and again. Would it improve the quality of life? Does it have any industrial application? And when they don't get an affirmative answer to any of these - then comes the clincher - why do you do it then?
Tough question. Someday the things we do might lead to something beneficial for the general public. And a lot of times it does. Those monster particle smashers lead to medical use of much smaller accelerators. But that's not the reason we do it. Proving or disproving the existence of Higgs is not the thing people talk about with their morning coffee. And an overwhelming majority of people's life wont slightly be affected if Standard Model or String Theory stands the test of time. Neither they care about where are all the Dark Matter is. So why do we do it then?
As Feynman says "Theoretical Physics is a human endeavor, one of the higher developments of human beings" - we do it because we want to do it. To find out how things really work at the deepest level gives an overwhelming sense of satisfaction. But wait - how many of us would go that far? Few breakthroughs stand the test of time -and most of us would be spending our lifetimes without doing anything fundamental. That raises another question - is it worth it? I guess it is. Just being part of this endeavour is a great feeling - in any field few go on to make the headlines-it cant be any different here. Even when you have not discovered it - knowing that you are among the select people on the planet who can actually understand it (What they call Popular Science is mostly crap - will talk about it in another post later) gives us that wonderful feeling. And that's our biggest reward. We don't do it for the people - we do it for ourselves!
Tough question. Someday the things we do might lead to something beneficial for the general public. And a lot of times it does. Those monster particle smashers lead to medical use of much smaller accelerators. But that's not the reason we do it. Proving or disproving the existence of Higgs is not the thing people talk about with their morning coffee. And an overwhelming majority of people's life wont slightly be affected if Standard Model or String Theory stands the test of time. Neither they care about where are all the Dark Matter is. So why do we do it then?
As Feynman says "Theoretical Physics is a human endeavor, one of the higher developments of human beings" - we do it because we want to do it. To find out how things really work at the deepest level gives an overwhelming sense of satisfaction. But wait - how many of us would go that far? Few breakthroughs stand the test of time -and most of us would be spending our lifetimes without doing anything fundamental. That raises another question - is it worth it? I guess it is. Just being part of this endeavour is a great feeling - in any field few go on to make the headlines-it cant be any different here. Even when you have not discovered it - knowing that you are among the select people on the planet who can actually understand it (What they call Popular Science is mostly crap - will talk about it in another post later) gives us that wonderful feeling. And that's our biggest reward. We don't do it for the people - we do it for ourselves!
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