Ashoka Reflections_DECEMBER 2023
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Ashoka Reflections | Page 08
“An Astronomy Minor,” said the Vice Chancellor Prof. Malabika Sarkar, about what she wished to see being
offered at Ashoka and soon. “The enthusiasm is immense.”
This was August 2021, when I was offered the task. I knew little about what this meant but was sold on the
idea. While it would take me nine more months to join the University, I did visit the campus in September
2021. On my way back, Prof. Bikram Phookun accompanied me to Delhi on a car ride, which turned out to be
a defining one. Heavy traffic slowed our progress, allowing a long, uninterrupted discussion on the
undergraduate Astronomy programme. Much of what followed has been built on the plans we hatched that
day.
Astronomy today is one of the most heavily funded research disciplines worldwide and is widely covered in
the news and popular articles. There needs to be more opportunities for undergraduate education though,
the current focus being mainly on the post-graduate level.
We wished for a curriculum that would be contemporary, informative and fun. The goal was also to put the
advanced student in touch with research skills. We came up with a bouquet of at least nine courses for the
students to choose from. The courses would span the full range of levels from introductory to advanced.
The Physics programme at Ashoka places a strong emphasis on laboratory work. Astronomy was going to be
no exception. Like in Physics, we decided that the introductory gateway course to Astronomy Minor would
also be hands-on. What could be better than to gaze up at the sky to start with?
That meant that we needed to first build an Astronomy laboratory. Thanks to the enthusiastic and generous
support of all concerned, we were able to acquire some equipment quickly. Several others we built from
scratch (and in fact from scrap)! For the supremely talented Pradip Chaudhari, senior technician at the Physics
Laboratory, this was a labour of love. By the end of 2022, we were ready with a set of truly unique astronomy
experiments.
The Astronomy Minor was launched in Spring 2023. In the first batch of the gateway laboratory course
Observing the Cosmos, we had students spanning all years and from diverse majors such as Physics, Computer
Science, History and Political Science. Over the semester, they learned how to navigate the sky and estimate
distances and motions. They engaged in astrophotography, obtained spectra and determined the
temperature and composition of stars.
That was just one of several new courses. Among the others was The Physics of the Universe, which described
how everything around us came to be, starting from the early days of the Big Bang. The Violent Universe talked
about energetic sources and phenomena, including pulsars, quasars and explosions like supernovae. A
course on Cosmic Messengers delivered in two parts—theory and laboratory—dealt with the origin,
propagation and detection of radiation at all wavelengths, from radio to gamma rays, as well as gravitational
waves and energetic particles. Students learned to handle, analyse and interpret data from cutting-edge
professional astronomical observatories. Also in the mix were advanced courses such as Astrophysical and
Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Computational Astrophysics and Geophysics and General Relativity and Cosmology.
Teaching this array of courses was always going to be challenging, particularly as there was no suitable
teaching material readily available. We needed additional faculty members with a rare combination of
breadth, depth and a sense of adventure. It was our great fortune that Prof. Kandaswamy Subramanian, a
renowned astrophysicist, readily agreed to our request to join Ashoka University as a visiting professor to help
with the programme. That was a key moment.
In Monsoon 2023, we had Prof. Sujan Sengupta visiting us as a guest faculty to teach a course on The Earth
and Other Planets. Prof. Sengupta is India’s top expert in the rapidly developing area of Exoplanets and has a
unique perspective to offer on planets in and outside the solar system, habitability and extraterrestrial life.
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