1. Thanu Padmanabhan was an Indian theoretical physicist and cosmologist whose research spanned a wide variety of topics in gravitation, structure formation in the universe and quantum gravity.
23 Facts About Thanu Padmanabhan
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Thanu Padmanabhan published nearly 300 papers and reviews in international journals and ten books in these areas.
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Thanu Padmanabhan made several contributions related to the analysis and modelling of dark energy in the universe and the interpretation of gravity as an emergent phenomenon.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was a Distinguished Professor at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics at Pune, India.
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Thanu Padmanabhan joined the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai in 1979 for his Ph.
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Thanu Padmanabhan held various faculty positions at TIFR from 1980 to 1992 and spent a year at the Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge.
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Thanu Padmanabhan moved to Pune to work at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1992 and served as its Dean, Core Academic Programmes, for 18 years.
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Thanu Padmanabhan served as chairman of the Time Allocation Committee of the Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope of NCRA.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was chairman of the Indian National Science Academy's National Committee which interfaces with the activities of the International Astronomical Union.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was elected president of the Cosmology Commission of the International Astronomical Union and provided advice to IAU activities in this field.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was elected in 2011 as chairman of the Astrophysics Commission of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics and co-ordinated the activities of IUPAP in this area.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was a visiting faculty at many institutes including the California Institute of Technology, Princeton University, and a Sackler Distinguished Astronomer of the Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was an elected fellow of The World Academy of Sciences and of all three National Academies of Science in India.
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Thanu Padmanabhan did a comic strip serial The Story of Physics aimed at school children.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was married to Vasanthi Padmanabhan, who has a Ph.
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Thanu Padmanabhan died on 17 September 2021 at the age of 64 after a heart attack at his residence in Pune.
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Thanu Padmanabhan's research was on the fields of gravitation and cosmology which includes quantum gravity and nature of dark energy.
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Thanu Padmanabhan could show that several peculiar aspects of classical gravitational theories find natural interpretations in this approach.
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Thanu Padmanabhan developed the complex path method to study black hole thermodynamics which was a precursor to the 'tunneling paradigm' that became quite popular later on.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was a recognized authority in the subject of the statistical mechanics of gravitating systems and was a pioneer in the systematic application of these concepts to study the gravitational clustering in an expanding universe.
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Thanu Padmanabhan was invited to lecture twice at the Les Houches Schools to a broader community about this subject.
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In November 2016, Thanu Padmanabhan published research studies advocating a new paradigm shift in understanding gravity.
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Thanu Padmanabhan introduced the notion of Cosmic Information, which allows these two phases to be connected in a fascinating manner.