Within the early Nineteen Thirties, the Indian-born physicist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1910-95), who was then learning on the College of Cambridge within the UK, proposed that not all stars change into white dwarves on the finish of their lifecycle. As a substitute, the sensible younger scientist argued, when stars had been of a sure mass, they might kind one thing denser than had ever beforehand been noticed. Because the US historian of science Daniel Kennefick explains within the quick documentary Shattering Stars, Chandrasekhar was ‘knocking on the door of what we’d now name a black gap’.
Directed by Peter Galison, a historian of science at Harvard College, Shattering Stars explores how Chandrasekhar’s groundbreaking theories would draw each the eye and mock of Arthur Eddington, who was then maybe the world’s preeminent astronomer. In doing so, Eddington possible set again progress in his subject, and definitely altered the trajectory of Chandrasekhar’s life and profession. Chandrasekhar would finally win the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1983 for his work on stellar evolution – albeit some 50 years after he’d introduced his concepts to the Royal Astronomical Society. Instructed by means of animation and audio recordings – together with of Chandrasekhar himself – Galison’s quick highlights the life and work of one of many twentieth century’s most sensible scientific minds, whereas exploring how scientific pursuits are inevitably topic to human shortcomings.