Obituary: 1983 Physics Nobelist S. Chandrasekhar Is Dead At Age 84

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, a winner of the 1983 Nobel Prize in physics whose theories about the evolution of stars led to the concept of black holes, died of heart failure on August 21 at the University of Chicago Hospitals. He was 84 years old. STELLAR: Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar "In a sense, Chandra's [death] comes as an end of an era," comments his friend and colleague Eugene Parker, who is currently the S. Chandrasekhar Distinguished Professor, Emeritus, at the University of Chicago, whe

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Chadrasekhar STELLAR: Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar

While still a student in the 1930s, Chandrasekhar developed a theory that challenged the prevalent notion of the formation of 'white dwarfs.' Most astrophysicists in those times believed that after burning up their fuel, stars collapsed into planet-sized entities that they referred to as white dwarfs. However, through his calculations, Chandrasekhar proposed that only stars equivalent in size to the sun became dwarfs. If the mass of the star were greater than 1.4 times the sun, he claimed, the star would continue to collapse into an object of enormous density. Although he was publicly ridiculed for this -- especially by his idol, the British astrophysicist Sir Arthur Eddington -- his theories form the basis for modern astrophysics: The critical mass he predicted is called the 'Chandrasekhar limit,' and the objects of infinite density are widely referred to as 'black holes.' This work led to his Nobel Prize ...

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