Chandrasekhar Subrahmanyan

Chandrasekhar Subrahmanyan, commonly known as S. Chandrasekhar, was an influential astrophysicist who made significant contributions to our understanding of stellar structure and evolution, particularly regarding white dwarfs. His work explained how the mass of a star determines its fate, leading to the concept known as the Chandrasekhar limit, which describes the maximum mass a white dwarf can have before collapsing into a neutron star or black hole. His research also extended to laboratory plasma physics, where he studied the behavior of ionized gases, highlighting the similarities between cosmic plasmas and controlled laboratory environments. Chandrasekhar was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1983.