Happy Republic Day, fellow proud citizens. 🇮🇳 Today is an interesting day to share some snippets about a forefather of Indian science.

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

This is the first in a series of posts about space and science tidbits. #SpaceGrains

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

4. Place value system: he came up with the idea of writing numbers the way we do today- so that digits have value. 263 = 200+60+3 pic.twitter.com/50oZ0pZ2YM

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Aryabhata is one of the most brilliant minds to ever come out of our land. pic.twitter.com/h9JXzFy0UR

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Right off the bat, let's establish how his name is spelled. Aryabhata has one T. "Bhatta", meaning scholar and the origin of the surnames+

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Bhat, Bhatt, Bhattacharya, etc, was customarily added as a title. Which would make him Aryabhata Bhatta, but no one ever said that. 😁

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Aryabhata is a well known name in history textbooks but is incredibly underappreciated and constantly attributed for something he didn't do.

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Aryabhata was born in 476CE in either modern-day Bihar or Kerala, we aren’t sure. There's an ongoing debate about this.

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

But we are reasonably sure that he headed the Nalanda University at Patna, which had an astronomical observatory. Its ruins are spectacular! pic.twitter.com/ZBB7NQkMq0

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Aryabhata was a mathematician and an astronomer, made prominent contributions to both fields.

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

- Zero debate: he is often credited with inventing the number,but the idea of a number that denotes nothing had existed in India for a while

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

These numbers traveled to Persia through the mathematician Al-Khwarizmi who combined Greek (already pervasive) and Hindu numbers from +

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Aryabhata’s works, wrote an explanation for the use of zero, and lent his name to “algorithm.” The Hindu number system spread to Arabia+

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

through Al-Khwarizmi, and then to the West. Therefore it became known as "Arabic numerals."

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

2. Trigonometry: Trig was developed in Greece and Egypt earlier, but Aryabhata came up with concepts of basic trig, with jya and kotijya

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

which went on to become sine and cosine. (And more)

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

3. Pi: he calculated the ratio of circumference to diameter of a circle as ((4 + 100) × 8 + 62000)/20000 = 62832/20000 = 3.1416

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

That's pretty darn accurate, I'd say. pic.twitter.com/puS8gTIDij

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

5. Eclipses: he went against prevailing Hindu wisdom of mythical Rahu and Ketu swallowing up bodies and explained shadows. (Image: Tirupati) pic.twitter.com/naehebKBHl

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

6. Rotation of earth: Naturally, figuring out eclipses meant he understood that the heavenly bodies were spheres (“gola”) and rotated about+

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

an axis. He calculated the earth’s rotation as well, and to a value of 23 hrs, 56 min, 4.1 sec. Guess what the actual value is?

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4.091 seconds. pic.twitter.com/fGsHETYokp

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Aryabhata’s legacy lives through us in a number of ways. @isro named India’s very first satellite, launched in 1975, after him. #SpaceGrains pic.twitter.com/9pRTTTUWXG

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Our own @TeamIndus has the entire main block named for him as well! (Come check out the campus at one of the Open Houses) pic.twitter.com/RYPqNcQHsa

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

The Panchangam (Hindu calendar) and Jalali (Muslim calendar) used across the globe is modeled almost entirely on the calendar he created.

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

His name was borrowed by numerous educational institutions and universities throughout the country, most prominently in Bihar.

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

.@isro scientists discovered a new species of bacteria in the stratosphere in 2009, that is now named "Bacillus aryabhata."

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

Lastly, there is a crater on the moon that is named after Aryabhata! pic.twitter.com/zFiBuRgJtu

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

That concludes my first session of #SpaceGrains here! I hope this was informative and fun. This is @sandygrains signing off. Be back soon!

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

.@sandygrains took over @TeamIndus handle to tweet this amazing series on Aryabhata. https://t.co/vUjXPGuKWl

— TeamIndus (@TeamIndus) January 26, 2017

@TeamIndus @sandygrains can u make this into storify or like a small blog.. Many ppl not on twitter need to know this

— vipul bothara (@drvipulbothara) January 26, 2017

@TeamIndus @sandygrains This is great!
Maybe make use of Twitter Moment for this thread

— Ankit Kumar (@_quietguy) January 26, 2017

@TeamIndus great info ..how about compiling this info in a blog or ppt. will be more shareble..people need to know this

— Archana kulshrestha (@archana13) January 26, 2017

My thread 👇 https://t.co/2PMHscWDwq

— Sandhya Ramesh (@sandygrains) January 26, 2017

@sandygrains Aryabhata conceived of the elliptical orbits of the planets a thousand years! before Kepler in the West,
they won't tell u dis pic.twitter.com/5hQ8wi6E4I

— calmwinds (@eratticritic) January 26, 2017

@sandygrains Aryabhata conceived of the elliptical orbits of the planets a thousand years! before Kepler in the West,
they won't tell u dis pic.twitter.com/5hQ8wi6E4I

— calmwinds (@eratticritic) January 26, 2017