Vainu Bappu

Vainu Bappu

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Category: Science

Vainu Bappu Profile

  • Name:
  • Vainu Bappu
  • Other Name:
  • Manali Kallat Vainu Bappu
  • Born:
  • August 10, 1927
  • Died:
  • August 19, 1982
  • Father:
  • Manali Kukuzhi
  • Mother:
  • Sunanna Bappu

Vainu Bappu Biography

Manali Kallat Vainu Bappu, shortly known as Vainu Bappu was an Indian astronomer and president of the International Astronomical Union. Bappu is regarded as the father of modern Indian astronomy. He has been instrumental in initiating many astronomical institutions in India of which Vainu Bappu Observatory named after him needs special mention. He has also contributed to the establishment of the modern Indian Institute of Astrophysics. In 1957, along with American astronomer Olin Chaddock Wilson he discovered the Wilson-Bappu effect.

 

Vainu Bappu was born in Chennai on August 10, 1927 to Manali Kukuzhi and Sunanna Bappu. His family originally hails from Thalassery, Kerala. His father was an astronomer at the Nizamiah Observatory, AP. He completed PG from Madras University and took PhD from Harvard Graduate School of Astronomy. Bappu, along with his two colleagues discovered the 'Bappu-Bok-Newkirk' comet and gave it their names. He received Donhoe Comet-Medal by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific in 1949. In 1957, he published a paper aside American astronomer Olin Chaddock Wilson and it was later known by the name Wilson-Bappu effect.

 

When Vainu returned back to India, he was appointed as head of a team of astronomers to build an observatory at Nainital. Optical telescope and a research observatory led to the formation of an optical observatory of Kavalur in 1986. It was named after him and inaugurated by Rajiv Gandhi. Vainu Bappu Observatory is one of the main observatories of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics that has given numerous discoveries later.

 

He has served in different top positions throughout his career, both national and international. Honorary Foreign Fellow at Belgium Academy of Sciences, Honorary Member at American Astronomical Society, Vice-President and President Positions at International Astronomical Union during the terms 1967–73 and 1979 respectively. He died on August 19, 1982.

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Updated: February 17, 2014

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