Albert Einstein (left) in dialog with J. Robert Oppenheimer. Picture taken in 1949 when Dr. Oppenheimer was director of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, New Jersey, U.S.A.
| Photo Credit: The Hindu Archives
In the late Nineteen Thirties, in a small nook of Thayyur, Thrissur, a pair had their third woman youngster, and nobody ever predicted that she would later turn out to be one of many first Indian ladies and Malayali to meet the daddy of the atomic bomb, J. Robert Oppenheimer. This is the story of T.Okay. Radha.
Growing up in a village, T.Okay. Radha usually described her childhood by learning underneath kerosene lamps surrounded by nature. Quite good at research, her sisters motivated their dad and mom to ship Radha to examine intermediate (class 11 and 12 at current instances).
She then went on to examine at Stella Maris College in Chennai (erstwhile Madras) and managed to rating a 100% in arithmetic and 98% in Physics. Due to her eager curiosity within the topic, she went on to do a Physics honours diploma at Presidency College regardless of societal considerations about it being a co-education system.
The beginning of a physicist
Passing with flying colors and a gold medal from Presidency College, Radha then determined to pursue a grasp’s diploma in Nuclear Physics at Madras University underneath the mentorship of Professor Aladi Ramakrishnan. Particle Physics was an upcoming topic again then, and Radha was in a position to discover the identical extra throughout this era. Being an upcoming college crammed with a superb era of Indian researchers, a number of overseas phycists Robert Marshak, and Niels Bohr usually visited their campus, giving them a lot larger publicity on the earth of physics.
Radha went on to full her PhD underneath Professor Alladi Ramakrishnan and even attended a cummer college on Elementary Particle physics in Trieste, Italy. This caught the attention of two eminent physicists of the time, Professor Leonard I. Schiff and Professor Robert Marshak, who each supplied her post-doctoral fellowships at universities like Stanford and Rochester. This, within the Nineteen Sixties, is the testimony to her brilliance within the area.
The turning level
It was in 1965 that the historic turning level of T.Okay. Radha’s life got here when J. Robert Oppenheimer himself despatched a letter to her inviting her to spend an instructional yr on the Institute of Advanced Studies in Princeton.
As talked about by T.Okay. Radha in an interview with the Malayalam every day Mathrubhumi, “I met Prof. Oppenheimer one-on-one within a few days of my arrival,” she recalled. “He was a very kind man. When he heard from his secretary that I had paid my airfare to New York out of my pocket, he asked me to meet him and immediately issued a cheque for the amount. We discussed my research work whenever I had the opportunity to see him.”
By mid 1966, Radha was prepared to return to India and broaden the Indian science scene with the publicity and expertise she gained at Princeton. Enroute her journey was a seminar scheduled at Edmonton, Canada, the place her life shifted after assembly her future husband, Dr Vembu Gourishankar, a professor of Electrical Engineering there.
Soon, she received married and continued to train in Canada till she determined to prioritise motherhood. The societal shifts taking place across the similar time have been fairly speedy, and the schools Radha tried to method afterwards weren’t wanting to rent ladies, particularly ladies who had husbands with jobs.
However, that by no means stopped Radha from diving into extra advanced research, and shortly she educated herself in laptop science and labored as a pc analyst on the University of Alberta’s Physics Department for greater than a decade. Her experience in each physics and laptop science made her stand out within the space. She was publishing papers all through the identical time, and a number of other professors additionally made her a co-author on their papers as nicely.
A gem who broke many obstacles and achieved what many solely dreamt of, Radha Gourishankar stays an inspiring title and mentor for physicists all over the world.
Published – March 30, 2026 09:00 am IST
