Romance blooms in pursuit of physics
Read more:Tata Institute for Fundamental Research|Suchandra Datta|Subir Sarkar|Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics|god particle
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Subir Sarkar and Suchandra Datta together in Italy.
KOLKATA: Love for physics got them together. And in between shuttling in and out of research laboratories in Europe and USA, Subir Sarkar and Suchandra Datta discovered they had more in common than just an affinity for matter and mass.
They fell in love at Tata Institute for Fundamental Research, got married after passing out, and have spent the better part of their marital life in pursuit of the God particle.
Subir and Suchandra are members of SINP's high-profile CMS group.
Their assignments have kept them apart for months, even years. While Sarkar worked at the CMS laboratory in Rome, Suchandra was stationed at Pisa. They would get to meet once a week. "When she worked in the USA, we could talk just once a week and wouldn't meet for months. Scientists don't have a social life. For the first 15 years of marriage, we hardly got to meet," said Sarkar.
They both did their masters at North Bengal University, where they realized they had developed a chemistry in the pursuit of physics. They both loved reading Sunil Gangopadhyay, Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay and Samaresh Basu. Subir topped the university, Suchandra came second. Sharing a passion for research, they headed for TIFR in 1991 and got married in 1993.
"Initially, I had a reservation against their marriage", said Suchandra's mother Mamata Dutta. "It was not for Subir as groom. I rather feared that there would be an ego clash because they are in the same subject. But they proved me wrong." As always, they journeyed to Italy together.
"Once you chose research as a profession, you must sacrifice social life. We could not meet for months," said Subir. Whenever they got the chance, they ran off to villages in Italy. "That was all our enjoying together apart from our experiments", said Suchandra.
Doctoral and post doctoral degrees came all in the way of experiments. Staying in Italy for years and going to Chicago for months, have indeed done a lot for both of them. "Could we ever think that we could come across so many Nobel laurets at a time?", said Subir. Further the attitude of the Italians and the work atmosphere there never allowed them to look at themselves.
"But when we tried to come back after spending seven years in Italy, we found there was no job for us here," laughed Suchandra. None of the institutes or universities in India found them "suitable". Finally, thanks to the director of Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, the couple could return home in 2011.
Embarrassed with the celebrity tag, Subir still laments, "The collection of Sagarmoy Ghosh is still not completed. Even the writings of Kamalkumar Majumder bought recently are untouched." They found time to scribble poems on Facebook. Suchandra, on the other hand, yearns to talk to her mother at home.
They fell in love at Tata Institute for Fundamental Research, got married after passing out, and have spent the better part of their marital life in pursuit of the God particle.
Subir and Suchandra are members of SINP's high-profile CMS group.
Their assignments have kept them apart for months, even years. While Sarkar worked at the CMS laboratory in Rome, Suchandra was stationed at Pisa. They would get to meet once a week. "When she worked in the USA, we could talk just once a week and wouldn't meet for months. Scientists don't have a social life. For the first 15 years of marriage, we hardly got to meet," said Sarkar.
They both did their masters at North Bengal University, where they realized they had developed a chemistry in the pursuit of physics. They both loved reading Sunil Gangopadhyay, Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay and Samaresh Basu. Subir topped the university, Suchandra came second. Sharing a passion for research, they headed for TIFR in 1991 and got married in 1993.
"Initially, I had a reservation against their marriage", said Suchandra's mother Mamata Dutta. "It was not for Subir as groom. I rather feared that there would be an ego clash because they are in the same subject. But they proved me wrong." As always, they journeyed to Italy together.
"Once you chose research as a profession, you must sacrifice social life. We could not meet for months," said Subir. Whenever they got the chance, they ran off to villages in Italy. "That was all our enjoying together apart from our experiments", said Suchandra.
Doctoral and post doctoral degrees came all in the way of experiments. Staying in Italy for years and going to Chicago for months, have indeed done a lot for both of them. "Could we ever think that we could come across so many Nobel laurets at a time?", said Subir. Further the attitude of the Italians and the work atmosphere there never allowed them to look at themselves.
"But when we tried to come back after spending seven years in Italy, we found there was no job for us here," laughed Suchandra. None of the institutes or universities in India found them "suitable". Finally, thanks to the director of Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, the couple could return home in 2011.
Embarrassed with the celebrity tag, Subir still laments, "The collection of Sagarmoy Ghosh is still not completed. Even the writings of Kamalkumar Majumder bought recently are untouched." They found time to scribble poems on Facebook. Suchandra, on the other hand, yearns to talk to her mother at home.
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