IT is not unpatriotic to admit that physical science as practiced today in our country did not grow here. It came out of Europe through the foundation laid by Copernicus, Galileo and Newton. Though we had great traditions in India in subjects like mathematics and astronomy we went into a slumber for close to 900 years. The first serious practitioner of the subject arguably was Jagadish Chandra Bose who was born in 1858. Modern physics as we know it today began about 110 years ago when Bose demonstrated his pioneering experiment on transmission of electromagnetic waves, mainly in the microwave region, through solid walls to the Royal Institution of London.
It is interesting to note that though Bose, and subsequently, C.V. Raman, M.N. Saha, S.N. Bose and K.S. Krishnan worked in (‘British’) Calcutta and were undoubtedly influenced by the concept of English civil society and rational scientific approach, they had all aligned their scientific pursuit to a commitment to India’s freedom. They were thus individual giants with little institutional support from the British government.
In fact, the plethora of scientific institutions and laboratories that we see today is an outgrowth of the post-independence era. Due mainly to the strong and active support to science evinced by our first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, India marched ahead with great earnestness in establishing a large number of government departments for promoting science. Thus, physics got an enormous boost from the creation of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) by H.J. Bhabha, of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) by S.S. Bhatnagar and of the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) by P.C. Mahalanobis. The effort continued with vigour and saw the growth in the late seventies and thereafter of the Department of Science and Technology (DST).
However, all the laboratories that were founded under the umbrellas of the departments, physics being no exception, were developed outside the university system. The underlying idea was akin to the existing model in the Soviet bloc, but the mushrooming of national laboratories in India was also accompanied by a decline of scientific research in the university system. After all, J.C. Bose first worked in Presidency College before he founded the Basu Vigyan Mandir (Bose Institute – now under DST), C.V. Raman was in Calcutta University and the Indian Institute of Science before establishing the Raman Research Institute (also under DST), M.N. Saha moved from Allahabad University to create the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (now under the aegis of the DAE), and so on. Thus, there has been an ‘internal brain drain’ from the universities to institutes, further impoverishing the former. We will return to this point later.
Given this background to the numerous government supported initiatives, it is pertinent to name institutions where large-scale physics research is being carried out. It is to Homi Bhabha’s grand vision and commitment to self-reliance that we owe the creation of the DAE and its range of physics activities. Indeed, it is Bhabha who laid the foundation of modern physics in resurgent and independent India.
Under DAE we have the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), both in Mumbai; the Centre for Advanced Technology (CAT), Indore, Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMSc), Chennai; Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR), Kalpakkam; Institute of Physics (IOP), Bhubaneswar; Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP) and the Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC), both in Kolkata; the Harishchandra Research Institute (HRI), Allahabad and the Institute of Plasma Research (IPR) in Gandhinagar.
Under the aegis of the CSIR the most prominent physics institute is the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) located in New Delhi. The DST supports the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research (JNCASR), the Raman Research Institute (RRI), the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), all in Bangalore; the S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences (SNBNCBS), the JC Bose Institute and the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS), all in Kolkata. In addition, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), which split off from DAE after Bhabha’s death, maintains a high profile physics institute in Ahmedabad called the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL).
Teaching (up to M.Sc level) plus research is being carried out at the Indian Institutes of Technology – in Kharagpur, Guwahati, Kanpur, New Delhi, Roorkee, Mumbai and Chennai, the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, Central Universities – Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Delhi University and Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi; University of Hyderabad, Banaras Hindu University (BHU); Aligarh Muslim University (AMU); Viswabharati in Shantinikentan; North Eastern Hill University (NEHU) in Shillong; Pondicherry University, and a very large number of state-supported universities. In addition, the University Grants Commission (UGC) has created specialized Inter-University Centres, namely the Nuclear Science Centre (NSC) in New Delhi; the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune and the Inter-University Centre in Indore.
The physics research in the country follows the worldwide trend in being concentrated on the following main areas: high energy physics, astronomy and astrophysics, nuclear physics, condensed matter and materials physics, statistical, plasma and nonlinear physics, and atomic, molecular and optical physics. If high energy physics is further subdivided into (i) phenomenology, (ii) field theory, (iii) string theory and (iv) experimental high energy physics, India has a large number of programmes in the first three subareas, but very little activity in experimental high energy physics.
This is not to suggest that there are no high energy experimentalists, but the majority of them perform their experiments abroad. In fact, string theory, which is an attempt to reach the ‘final theory’ which will unify gravity with nature’s other basic interactions involving strong, weak and electromagnetic forces, has a strong presence in the country which, in terms of quality, is comparable to the best in the world. Similarly, the country can be proud to posses a large number of good phenomenologists.
In experimental astronomy and astrophysics, there has been a substantial investment in telescope facilities in Pune, Ooty and Hanle. This effort was initiated by Vaini Bappu and his colleagues at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Bangalore and Kodai Kanal. Through the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics of TIFR, India can boast of a world class facility in indigenously developed Giant Metre Radio Telescope, located in the outskirts of Pune. The leadership in the areas of radio and atmospheric sciences was provided by S.K. Mitra and his colleagues at the Institute of Radio Physics and Electronics of Calcutta University. This tradition of research and training has continued with vigour in Kolkata and has branched off to other centers such as NPL, PRL, and IIT Kharagpur. When it comes to nuclear physics, a large number of traditional university departments have been pursuing the subject but the experimental attention has been limited to a cyclotron in VECC and linear accelerators in NSC and TIFR wherein only low to medium energy measurements can be made.
The three areas mentioned above, viz., high energy physics, astronomy and astrophysics as well as nuclear physics, require ‘big science’ facilities comprising high energy accelerators, large telescopes, observatories, synchrotrons, reactors, and so on. These facilities need heavy investment of resources, which for a country like ours are naturally limited. On the other hand, condensed matter and materials physics – a subject that is closely connected to technology, involving, for instance, superconductivity, magnetism, semiconductors and nanomaterials, to name a few – can be effectively carried out even in university departments, because it needs ‘small science’ inputs. Thus, basic facilities of resistivity, heat capacity, thermal and electrical conductivity measurements, magnetic, dielectric and mechanical susceptibilities, etc., can be easily set up with reasonable investments, and good physics can be done.
However, in comparison to the international scene, condensed matter experiments in India could have done better if we had sophisticated infrastructure, sample preparation and characterization facilities. It is also lamentable that researchers in condensed matter physics still have to run for ‘beam time’ to overseas neutron scattering and synchrotron facilities even though the DAE has invested in these two areas at BARC and CAT. Neither do we have functional large magnet and cryogenic centres in the country.
Similarly, high quality experiments in nonlinear optics and plasma physics can be carried out at only TIFR and IPR, and we have isolated pockets of excellence in theoretical quantum/nonlinear optics and plasma physics, notably at PRL and IPR. In contrast, the country has a large number of statistical physics theorists – about 250 of them recently participated in the prestigious international conference on the subject held in Bangalore in July 2004. Indian statistical physicists have made internationally renowned contributions, perhaps inspired by S.N. Bose’s pioneering work on the Bose-Einstein statistics.
The United States, Western Europe and Japan continue to dominate the world of physics. Most of the recent Nobel prizes in physics have gone to scientists in the USA and Western Europe. How are they then different from us even though we have similar goals? For one, the investment in physics in these countries in terms of percentage GDP is more than double of India. Even a single American university can boast of equal number of physicists in its faculty as in our premier institute, TIFR!
But what is perhaps more important is the realization in the western countries of the importance of technology spin-offs for basic research. There is continual synergy between technology on the one hand, and basic physics on the other – technology leads to a spurt in basic physics while research in basic physics yields technology. Examples are superconductivity, lasers, giant magneto resistive (GMR) compounds, nanomaterials, etc. What is also quite remarkable is that the gap between a basic physics discovery and marketable technology product has been gradually narrowing.
For instance, superconductivity was discovered around 1913 and it took the world more than 60 years to implement its applications. The gap became narrower in the case of lasers – the basic concept was enunciated in the 1920s whereas discovery and practical applications came about 40 years later. On the other hand, GMR and nanomaterials took only about 15 years from the time of basic invention to becoming market products. We have not yet seen this kind of symbiosis between basic physics and industry in our country.
Moving away from materials physics and technology and into the domain of fundamental physics, the western countries continue to show a will to develop higher energy accelerators, particularly in the European consortium of CERN in Geneva, which are expected to throw light on still elusive particles such as the Higgs bosons and even the string theory. Our accelerator effort is nowhere comparable to even that of China.
Where do we stand? As mentioned above, our input in terms of funding of physics research continues to be subcritical. Thus, while we have been able to make a mark and create a few leaders in string theory, the theory of statistical physics or in select theoretical topics of nonlinear phenomena and optics, our contribution to cutting-edge physics research continues to remain below global standards. What is also alarming is the recent decline in physics publications in the so-called impact-factor journals from India, in comparison to say China and Korea.
What are the reasons for this perceived decline? I have already mentioned the issue of funding. It is crucial to realize that physics is essentially an experimental science – all about understanding and explaining natural phenomena. Although we have got a few excellent facilities in our laboratories, we still lack a critical mass in terms of input and matching infrastructure. C.V. Raman worked successfully on his Nobel prize winning experiment on spectroscopy with only 200 rupees – this is not possible today. Physics is no longer an individual exercise as in the days of J.C. Bose, C.V. Raman, S.N. Bose and M.N. Saha – it flourishes only through collective and cooperative teamwork. Temperamentally, Indians have not achieved this goal.
I would like to profess another reason for our inability to reach the peak of physics and science, in general. If one looks at the success stories in the West, one would quickly realize that most of the breakthroughs have come from university settings, in which the professors have had a very interactive and engaging relationship with a vigorous bunch of students. Research has been carried out in conjunction with teaching as these two aspects of creative endeavour are intimately intertwined. In our country, we have kept divorced teaching from research by building research institutes outside the university system. Thus the institutes have been deprived of young, inquisitive minds joining the curriculum year after year, whereas the universities have been devoid of talent in its teaching faculty and optimum infrastructure, in addition to being plagued by political interference.
What are the outstanding issues in the world of physics today? In the realm of fundamental forces we have reached the ‘standard model’ which has incorporated electromagnetic, weak and strong interactions, except that this model has to be extended now in order to account for the neutrino mass. However, we are still far from unifying gravity to bring it under the universal umbrella of the standard model. String theory, which is an attempt in this direction, is active and thriving in our country, as mentioned earlier. There is also continuing debate on the nature and extent of our expanding universe and our understanding of the cosmos. Our efforts in this sector are limited.
A related issue, which borders the subjects of nuclear physics and high energy physics and which has a bearing on the nature of the early universe, is concerned with the high density nuclear matter. The nucleons of a nucleus such as protons and neutrons are themselves made of elementary particles called quarks, which are bound by strong forces mediated by what are called gluons. The result is a ‘quark-gluon plasma’, the study of which can elucidate our understanding of quantum chromo dynamics. While there is some presence of theory, the experimental effort in India leaves some room for improvement.
When it comes to condensed matter and materials physics, the enigma of strongly correlated electron systems and its manifestation into high temperature superconductivity, GMR property of manganites and other novel behaviour of materials, continue to baffle physicists. Thus, we do not yet have a satisfactory theory of high temperature superconductivity even though the phenomenon was discovered about 20 years ago. Efforts in this direction are patchy in our country.
A related new development is in the domain of nanoscience. When the size of a system is reduced such that one dimension is of the order of a nanometer (i.e. about ten interatomic spacings), one sees fascinating and novel properties which can be put to important applications. Thus everything that we are familiar with in the domain of ‘linear’ physics such as the Hooke’s law of elasticity, Ohm’s law of electrical conduction, Schroedinger quantum mechanics, among others, breaks down. The consequent non- linear, irreversible and ‘nonunitary’ quantum properties of nanomaterials endow them with unique memory effects which have significant device applications.
Our ability to tack a single atom or a molecule has led to atom force microscopy or single molecule spectroscopy that has opened new vistas into nanobiology. Further careful experimental and theoretical studies of the quantum coherence properties of a nanomaterial are expected to yield important clues to our efforts in building a quantum computer. It is heartening to see that the country, in recognition of the significance of nanophysics in shaping our future, has made large scale experimental investment through a DST-sponsored initiative in nano science and technology. The behaviour of matter under intense laser fields with implications for fusion research is yet another partially explored terrain and needs further attention and input.
Before concluding, I want to stress that in addition to increasing budget allocations in science and technology sector what is additionally needed is to network our existing facilities in institutes, national laboratories and universities. The alienation of the universities from the national laboratories is doing good to neither sector. It is necessary to bring these two activities closer together in terms of joint teaching and research programmes, and adjunct faculty schemes, in order to harness the existing science talent as well as to give our young students access to state of the art facilities.
It is a matter of concern that our youth is being lured away from basic physics (and science, in general) to apparently greener pastures, and therefore it is time to make postgraduate and undergraduate (and even high school) physics curriculum exciting and challenging. It is also important to educate young people on myriad career opportunities that emanate from a basic training in physics. Both our universities and national institutes have their task cut out in fulfilling this objective.
* I am grateful to B.M. Deb, B. Dutta Roy, C.N.R. Rao and A.K. Raychaudhuri for stimulating discussions on the topic presented here.
