Aryabhatta was a famous Indian mathematician and astronomer born in 476

CE during the Gupta Age. He is considered to be one of the mathematicians

who changed the course of mathematics and astronomy to a great extent. He
was among the first in the entire world to suggest the theory that the earth
rotates on its axis. He also explained solar and lunar eclipses, solved
quadratic equations and knew the use of ‘zero’. One of his greatest
achievements was the fact that he worked on the approximation of ‘pi’ and
concluded it to be an irrational number!
It is believed that Aryabhatta may have authored at-least three books out of
which only one survives. ‘Aryabhatiya’ the only book of Aryabhatta which
survives is a small treatise written in 118 verses. This great mathematical
masterpiece of the past starts with 10 verse introductions, which is then
followed by mathematical section which is written in 33 verses that gives out
66 mathematical rules. The mathematical part of the Aryabhatiya is about
algebra, arithmetic, plane trigonometry and spherical trigonometry in addition
to advanced mathematics on continued fractions, quadratic equations, sums
of power series and a table of sines. Other notable contributions of Aryabhatta
include:
 He worked out the area of a triangle.
 He worked on the summation of series of squares and cubes
 He talks about the “rule of three” which is to find the value of x when
three numbers a, b and c is given.
 He calculated the volume of a sphere.
 Aryabhatta calculated the sidereal rotation which is the rotation of the
earth with respect to the stars as 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4.1 seconds.
 He calculated the length of the sidereal year as 365 days, 6 hours, 12
minutes and 30 seconds. The actual value shows that his calculations
was an error of 3 minutes and 20 seconds over a year.
To honour him the Indian Space Research Organization named its first satellite
after the genius mathematician and astronomer. A research establishment has
been set up in Nainital, called the Aryabhatta Research Institute of
Observational Sciences (ARIOS) to honor his contribution to the field of
science. There is also a lunar crater and a species of bacteria discovered by
ISRO named after Aryabhatta. The fact that such a great personality lived in
India during the golden period of Indian history and offered the world a
treasure trove of knowledge is truly amazing and a source of immense pride
for us Indians!