Sivaramakrishna Chandrasekhar, Indian physicist (Calcutta 06 August 1930 – Bangalore 08 March 2004)

Brother of material scientist Sivaraj Ramaseshan

Relative of Nobel prize winners being nephew of physicist C.V. Raman and cousin of astrophysicist Subramanyan Chandrasekhar

Predicted and discovered a new kind of liquid crystals, the discotic liquid crystals (1977)

Proposed a new type of quadratic formula for the optical rotary dispersion of crystals

Proposed and developed a simple method for estimating extinction effects experimentally in crystal analysis by the use of polarize x-rays (1960)

With V.N. Madhusudana & P.P. Kant developed a simple and direct method to measure twist elastic constant (1973)

With R. Nityananda, U.D. Kini & K.A. Suresh discovered the optical analogue of Borrmann effect in crystals (1975)

With B.K. Sadashiva & K.A. Suresh discovered a new type of liquid crystal phase (1977)

Established the physical behavior and properties of discotic systems

Demonstrated that liquid crystals properties could be induced in non-mesomorphic materials by pressure and conversely that mesophases in some systems could be suppressed

Synthesized the first paramagnetic nematogenic compounds

HONORS

Friedericksz Medal, Liquid Crystalline Society of the Russian Academy of Sciences (2000)

LINKS

http://dspace.rri.res.in/bitstream/2289/2285/1/2005%20Biog%20Mem%20INSA%20V28%20p133.pdf 

His brother, Sivaramakrishna Pancharatnam, physicist (Calcutta 09 February 1934 – Oxford 20 May 1969)

Discovered the geometric phase in optics (Pancharatnam-Berry phase) in 1965

Demonstrated the connection between light shifts and dispersion