[4] He was a pioneer in the investigation of radio microwave optics, made significant contributions to botany, and was a major force behind the expansion of experimental science on the Indian subcontinent.

[8] Jagadish Chandra Bose was born on 30 November 1858 to a Bengali Kayastha family of Brahmos in Mymensingh, Bengal Presidency (now part of Bangladesh).

[10] His father was a leading member of the Brahmo Samaj and worked as a civil servant with the title Deputy Magistrate and Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) in several places, including Faridpur and Bardhaman.

Speaking at the Bikrampur Conference in 1915, Bose described the effect this early education had on him: At that time, sending children to English schools was an aristocratic status symbol.

There, he met Jesuit Father Eugene Lafont, who played a significant role in developing his interest in natural sciences.

[11] Bose wanted to follow his father into the Indian Civil Service, but his father forbade it, saying his son should be a scholar who would “rule nobody but himself.”[14] Bose went to England to study medicine at the University of London, but had to quit because of allergies and ill health, possibly worsened by the chemicals used in the dissection rooms.

Henry Fawcett had given Bose an introduction to Lord Ripon, the Viceroy of India, who recommended him for a post to the Director of Public Instruction in Kolkata.

Although the principal Charles Henry Tawney and Director of Education Alfred Woodley Croft were reluctant to appoint him, Bose took up his post in January 1885.

After three years in this temporary post, the value of his professorial work was recognized by Tawney and Croft, who made Bose’s appointment permanent with retrospective effect.

[23] He began his own research in the new field in November 1894, setting up his equipment in small 20 ft sq room at Presidency College.

They felt he should focus only on teaching and that research involved neglect of his duties as a teacher, in spite of Bose giving 26 hours of weekly lectures.

Later, when interest was generated in the wider scientific community, the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal proposed a research post to help Bose.

[citation needed] Bose submitted his first scientific paper, "On polarisation of electric rays by double-refracting crystals," to the Asiatic Society of Bengal in May 1895.

[24] The paper described Bose's plans for a coherer, a term coined by Lodge referring to radio wave receivers, which he intended to "perfect" but never patented.

The paper was well received by The Electrician and The Englishman, which in January 1896 (commenting on how this new type of wall and fog penetrating "invisible light" could be used in lighthouses) wrote:[23] Should Professor Bose succeed in perfecting and patenting his ‘Coherer’, we may in time see the whole system of coast lighting throughout the navigable world revolutionised by a Bengali scientist working single handed in our Presidency College Laboratory.In November 1895 at a public demonstration at the Town Hall of Kolkata, Bose showed how the millimetre range wavelength microwaves could travel through the human body (of Lieutenant Governor Sir William Mackenzie), and over a distance of 23 metres through two intervening walls to a trigger apparatus he had set up to ring a bell and ignite gunpowder in a closed room.

[27] Bose went to London on a lecture tour and met Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi, who had been developing a radio wave wireless telegraphy system for over a year and was trying to market it to the British post service.

He was also congratulated by William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin and received an honorary Doctor of Science ( DSc) from the University of London.

In 1899, Bose announced the development of an "iron-mercury-iron coherer with telephone detector" in a paper presented at the Royal Society, London.

A 1.3 mm multi-beam receiver now in use on the NRAO 12  Metre Telescope, Arizona, US, incorporates concepts from his original 1897 papers.

[31] Sir Nevill Mott, Nobel Laureate in 1977 for his own contributions to solid-state electronics, remarked that "J.C. Bose was at least 60 years ahead of his time.

"[31]Bose's 1898 experiment on the optical rotation of microwaves in a twisted jute structure[34] pioneered the study of chiral media, and preceded the fields of artificial dielectrics and metamaterials by decades and a century, respectively.

[citation needed] Bose performed a comparative study of the fatigue response of various metals and organic tissue in plants.

The power of physical methods applies to the establishment of that truth which can be realised directly through our senses, or through the vast expansion of the perceptive range by means of artificially created organs... Thirty-two years ago I chose the teaching of science as my vocation.

Even had the capacity for inquiry and accurate observation been assumed to be present, there were no opportunities for their employment; there were neither well-equipped laboratories nor skilled mechanicians.

It is not for man to complain of circumstances, but bravely to accept, to confront and to dominate them; and we belong to that race which has accomplished great things with simple means.

[citation needed] Jatras, which were popular ancient plays, sparked his interest in the stories of the Mahabharata and Ramayana.

[53] On 14 September 2012, Bose's experimental work in millimetre-band radio was recognised as an IEEE Milestone in Electrical and Computer Engineering, the first such recognition of a discovery in India.

Jagadish Chandra Bose was featured in that nomination list for his pioneering work on technology that would enable later development of Wi-Fi.