Merch
News
Panchangam
Apps
Downloads
For Teachers
Resources
About
PEOPLE
IDEAS
PLACES
CULTURE
CREATE
STORIES
GAMES
J.C. Bose
जे.सी. बोस
The scientist who proved that plants feel
Years
1858 – 1937
Known as
Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose — physicist and plant physiologist
Birthplace
Mymensingh, Bengal (now Bangladesh)
Field
Scientists & Thinkers
“The boundary between the living and the non-living is thinner than we think.”
— J.C. Bose
The Story
Bose was a brilliant student who took the Natural Sciences Tripos at Cambridge after studying at Calcutta. He was appointed professor of physics at Presidency College, Calcutta, where — refused proper apparatus by the British administration — he built his own instruments with scrap metal, a habit of self-reliance that defined his science.
His research on the newly discovered radio waves, carried out in the 1890s, predated and paralleled Marconi's work — he demonstrated the wireless transmission of signals in Calcutta in 1895, a year before Marconi's patent. He is honoured as a pioneer of wireless communication.
His most famous work was on plant life: he invented the crescograph, which magnified the movements of plants thousands of times, and proved that plants respond to touch, drugs, and injury with the same electrical signals as animals. His book 'Response in the Living and Non-Living' is a classic. He founded the Bose Institute in 1917, and he died in 1937, honoured as one of the founders of modern science of Bhārat.
Core Ideas
The Crescograph
His instrument recorded the pulse of plants.
The Plant's Feeling
He proved plants respond to touch and harm.
The Radio Pioneer
His 1895 wireless demonstration predated Marconi.
The Self-Built Lab
He made his own instruments from scrap.
The Bose Institute
He founded Bhārat's first great research institute.
Why it matters today
J.C. Bose is honoured as one of the founders of modern science of Bhārat, and the Bose Institute he built still carries his work forward. His gentle proof that plants feel — like his early radio waves — helped put the science of Bhārat on the world map.