Obituary of Mukul R. Kundu

Solar Radio Physicist Mukul Ranjan Kundu 1930 - 2010

Mukul R. Kundu, professor emeritus of astronomy at the Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, College Park, died 17 June from complications following a car crash. He was 80 years old.

Mukul Kundu’s distinguished career included relentless pursuit of the Sun’s workings and training a vast number of students and postdoctoral fellows in solar physics and radio astronomy.

Mukul Kundu was born 10 February 1930, in Kolkata India. He received his BSc (Physics) and MSc (Radiophysics) degrees from University of Calcutta in 1949 and 1951, respectively. He received his DSc (Radio Astronomy) degree from University of Paris in 1957. After a postdoctoral position in University of Paris, he returned to India as Senior Research Fellow, at the National Physical Laboratory New Delhi. He went to the United States in 1958 accepting the position of an Associate Research Physicist, University of Michigan. After a brief stay at Cornell (1962-1965) as Associate Professor, Cornell University he returned to India to work at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai for another three years. He returned to the University of Maryland in 1968 as a Professor, where he worked until to the day of his tragic death.

In addition to using and promoting radioheliographs such as the Clark Lake Multi-frequency Radioheliograph, the Nancay Radioheliograph, and the Nobeyama Radioheliograph, Mukul Kundu was a pioneer in using non-solar radio telescopes for solar studies: the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT), the Very Large Array (VLA), and the Berkeley - Illinois - Maryland Array (BIMA ). He served as a Member of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO ) Users’ Committee (1970-79) and as a Member of the NRAO’s Very Large Array (VLA) Advisory Committee (1974-78).

He received numerous medals, honors, and awards during his distinguished science career starting with the Krishna Lal De Gold Medal of the University of Calcutta in 1949 to the George Ellery Hale Prize awarded by the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society in 2007. He was a fellow of the Royal Society, a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, and a member of the Editorial Board of Solar Physics since 1967. He served as the Director of the Astronomy program of the University of Maryland from 1978 to 1985.

He provided scientific leadership in the US and worldwide serving on numerous scientific committees. He served on the NRC panel of the National Academy of Sciences for nearly two decades. He himself was a NRC Senior Research Associate at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center during 1974 -1975. He also served as a member of National Science Foundation’s Advisory Panel for Atmospheric Sciences (1983-86).

Mukul Kundu was closely associated with most of the NASA solar missions and helped generate new knowledge by synthesizing radio observations with those in optical, X-ray, EUV, and other wavelengths. He served as a Member of NASA’s Solar Physics Management Operations Working Group (1990-91).

Mukul Kundu authored or co-authored more than 400 research publications from the ionosphere to the Sun to stars and galaxies. Although solar radio physics remained his main stay, he was involved in studies of radio galaxies, supernova remnants, nebulae, flare stars, and T-Tauri stars. His 660-page book Solar Radio Astronomy is known to every student of solar physics and remains useful for the past half a century. He was the lead editor of several specialized books in solar physics and solar radio physics.

Kundu believed in “healthy body - healthy mind”. He was a regular lunch-time swimmer all his life.

He is survived by his wife Ranu Kundu and three children.