A TRIBUTE TO SIR J. C BOSE ON HIS BIRTHDAY (30TH NOVEMBER): AN EXTRAORDINARY MAN OF SCIENCE IN PLANT PHYSIOLOGY & PHYSICS

Dr. BHASKAR CHAKRABORTY

Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose (born November 30, 1858 and died November 23, 1937) was an Indian plant physiologist and physicist whose invention of highly sensitive instruments for the detection of minute responses by living organisms to external stimuli enabled him to anticipate the parallelism between animal and plant tissues noted by later biophysicists. This exceptional man was a physicist, botanist and a pioneer in radio science and more. He conducted experiments to prove plants feel heat, cold, light, noise, happiness and pain. His instrument, the “Crescograph” can measure plant growth.

Contributions in Plant Physiology

A famous experiment conducted by Sir J.C Bose at the Royal Society of London in 1901 demonstrated that just like humans, plants too have feelings. He placed a plant in a vessel containing bromide solution, which was poisonous. Using his instrument, he showed on a screen how the plant responded to the poison. One could see rapid to and fro movement on the screen which finally died down. A similar thing would have happened if an animal was placed in the poison. The plant died due to the poison. He called his instrument “Crescograph” and conducted further experiments. Most scientists across the world praised his findings. J.C. Bose made some important discoveries in plant physiology. Turning his attention towards the electrical response of living things, he made invaluable contributions to electrophysiology and the inorganic models of biophysical phenomena.  He was a pioneer in studying the effect of microwaves on the membrane potential of plant tissues and how microwaves create changes in the cell membrane potential of plant tissues. In this endeavour, he found that both animal and plant tissues respond to electric stimuli when in contact with electricity rather than chemicals. However, plants show a slower response than animals. To measure this response, he invented the “Crescograph”, sensitive enough to catch the slower response by the plant tissues, even the millionth part of a millimeter of plant growth and movement. He also demonstrated that plants have a circulatory system using graphs produced by the “Crescograph” which is capable of identifying the upward movement of sap in plants is the activity of living cells. In this contest he has described the experimental details and findings in his books: “Response in the Living and Non-living” and “The Nervous Mechanism of Plants”.

Though Sir J.C Bose was a renowned Physicist but his interest towards “Plant Physiology” was always a special topic of interest and he dedicated himself to research solely in the field of plant physiology. This, no doubt, was something unexpected and unusual for a distinguished physicist who had already attained international recognition for his work on the “Optical properties of Radio waves and Wireless transmission” ahead of Guglielmo Marconi. Owing to his philosophical and overall scientific belief in ‘Unity of Life’ and evolution, he initially studied the effect of such waves on inorganic matter. Finding the response similar to animal muscle, he initiated his studies on plants. His observations and findings transformed him into a plant physiologist (an explorer of plant nervous system). In this quest, he devised a number of ingenious instruments enabling him to record the plant responses to a variety of stimuli. Notwithstanding some opposition, ridicule, disbelief and criticism initially, his observations in the early 1900’s ultimately found general acceptance by eminent biologists and plant physiologists globally. He presented his claim through lecture-demonstrations across the UK and Europe that the nerve impulses in all types of plants were similar to those in animals which was accepted by the eminent researchers and scientists all around the world.

From general electrical response of different parts of the plant, he proceeded to record responses from individual cells using microelectrode recording system devised by him. In those early years, prior to the 1920’s, such microelectrode studies had not yet been initiated on single neurons in animals. On the basis of a large number of studies, Bose concluded that plants, small or big have a “Nervous system” similar to animals. He reported, “Plants also have receptors for stimuli, conductors (nerves) which electrically code and propagate the stimulus and efferent or terminal motor organs” and further “The physiological mechanism of the plants is identical with that of the animal”. He established the nervous impulse and its transmission in plants, responsible for the control of many physiological functions including growth, ascent of the sap, respiration, photosynthesis, motor activity and response to the environment - light, heat, trauma, shock, and drugs and toxins. The “Action potential” (AP) follows the character and unipolarity of transmission in plants similar to that observed in animals. He even measured the speed of the nervous impulse within the petioles and found it to be as high as 400 mm/sec. Bose became the first to use the term ‘Plant Nerve’.

 

Contributions in Physics

Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose had invented the “Wireless Telegraphy” in 1895 and conducted research on radio waves. He improved an instrument called the “Coherer” that was used to detect radio waves but he did not file for a patent. In 1897, Italian scientist Guglielmo Marconi on the other hand had made a similar demonstration two years after Bose’s demonstration but Marconi filed for a patent in 1896. So, though Bose had done pioneering work in the field, Marconi got the credit for the invention. Jagadish Chandra Bose was not awarded the Nobel Prize. Despite his contributions and break through on wireless connectivity, the Nobel Prize in physics for wireless was awarded to Guglielmo Marconi in 1909 which is remembered as most “unfortunate” & “unjustified” in the history of Nobel Prize!

Bose’s experiments on the quasi-optical properties of very short radio waves (1895) led him to make improvements on the “Coherer”, an early form of radio detector, which have contributed to the development of solid-state physics.

Sir J.C Bose, in 1895, exhibited how electromagnetic waves could be sent wirelessly, not just through air but also through walls and even human bodies. Thus, Bose is recognized as the father of radio and wireless communication.  In his demonstration, the waves at a frequency of 60 GHz travelled around 23 meters. This demonstration was one year before Alexander S. Popov’s experiment and two years before Guglielmo Marconi’s demonstration. Eventually, Marconi got the Nobel Prize, but Bose couldn't. Bose used ultra-high frequency (up to 60 GHz) millimeter waves (between 5 mm and 25 mm of wavelength), that is, microwaves, to show his experiment. He constructed novel equipment such as “Horn antennas”, “Waveguides” and “Polarizers”, essential to modern microwave engineering and astronomy. Sir J.C Bose was interested in the optical properties of microwaves rather than the signaling potential of longer wavelengths. This was pioneering work on microwaves. At Cambridge University, in a lecture, he even speculated on the existence of electromagnetic waves from the Sun. To demonstrate that even metals respond to external stimuli, Sir J.C Bose also popularized numerous other instruments and called them “Bose instruments.” Bose's instruments have demonstrated how even steel and metals used in machinery and scissors can become worn out and regain their effectiveness after a short break To detect the signal of his own inventions, he invented a new “Coherer” made of a metal cup containing mercury. Bose’s coherer was in fact a semiconductor diode and his work led to the “World’s first patent on solid-state electronics” (diode detectors), which he got in 1904. It was a “Galena detector”. In this way, he was much ahead of time in solid-state electronics. He became the “First Asian to receive a US patent”. He even foresaw the development of “P-type and N-type semiconductors”.  Sir Nevill Mott, who won the Nobel Prize in 1977, said Bose was about 60 years ahead of his time and had rightly predicted use of N-type and P-type semiconductors in the future.

Sir J. C Bose was one of the first scientists of modern India, along with Acharya Prafulla Chandra Ray (Chemist) and S. Ramanujan (a mathematician), who elevated the nation's status through his experiments and discoveries. A polymath with diverse interests in Physics, Plant Physiology and even writing science fiction, J.C Bose is most popularly known for his research on “Electromagnetic waves” and his instruments such as the “Crescograph”. He founded “Bose Research Institute” in 1917 at Calcutta, as a centre for study in interdisciplinary sciences now known as “Bose Institute”. The immensely talented J. C Bose was one of India's first modern scientists. He was a pioneer in the field of wireless telecommunication, a field which would eventually lead to “Invention of the Radio, TV, WIFI and even Cell phones”.

J.C Bose was made a “Knighthood” in 1917 and a “Fellow of the Royal Society of London” in 1920 for his paper on "The Electromagnetic Radiation and Polarization of Electric Rays." He was the first Indian scientist to receive this honour in the field of physics & plant sciences. Along with Einstein, Curie, and Millikan, he represented “Asia” on the “League of Nations International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation”. He has a “Lunar Crater” named in his honour. The lifeline of Calcutta (two important roads) connecting North and South are named honouring Acharya J.C Bose and Acharya P.C Ray and are known as AJC Bose road & APC road.

Courtesy: Bose Institute archives, Calcutta

(The writer is a Professor of Chemistry Sikkim Government College (NBBGC), Tadong, Gangtok. Sikkim)