# Fame.am profile — machine-readable export
# Canonical URL: https://fame.am/person/chandra-wickramasinghe
# Generated: 2026-08-12T21:22:39.969Z

schema: https://schema.org/Person
url: "https://fame.am/person/chandra-wickramasinghe"
name: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
slug: "chandra-wickramasinghe"
description: "Nalin Chandra Wickramasinghe is a Sri Lankan-born British mathematician and astronomer. His research interests include the interstellar medium, infrared astronomy, light scattering theory, applications of solid-state physics to astronomy, the early Solar System, comets, astrochemistry, the origin of life and astrobiology. A student and collaborator of Fred Hoyle, the pair worked jointly for over 40 years as the most famous proponents of a non-mainstream version of panspermia, the proposal that life was seeded on Earth through space-based processes. In 1974 they proposed that some dust in interstellar space matched the spectral characteristics of freeze-dried bacteria, which was largely ignored at its publishing while the ubiquity of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons explains the apparent match."
tagline: "Astronomer"
image: "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/Chandra-Wickramasinghe.jpg?width=1200"
gender: "male"
category:
  name: "Scientists"
  slug: "scientists"
profileType:
  name: "Scientist"
  slug: "scientist"
  entityType: "https://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q39631"
birthDate: "1939-01-20"
livingStatus: "LIVING"
scores:
  popularity:           47.11
  momentum:             0.7625026651820614
  historical:           11.634668
  currentAttention:     0
  sourceConfidence:     65
  profileCompleteness:  65
  trendDirection:       "STABLE"
ranks:
  global:   null
  country:  null
  category: null
platforms:
  - platform:  "IMDB"
    url:       "https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3339702/"
    handle:    "nm3339702"
sources:
  - url: "https://pt.wikiquote.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
  - url: "https://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D8%AA%D8%B4%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%AF%D8%B1%D8%A7_%D9%88%D9%8A%D9%83%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%B3%D9%8A%D9%86%D8%BA"
    title: "تشاندرا ويكراماسينغ"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://ca.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramsinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramsinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://cy.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Chandra Wickramasinghe"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%92%D0%B8%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%BC%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%B3%D1%85%D0%B5%2C_%D0%A7%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B4%D1%80%D0%B0"
    title: "Викрамасингхе, Чандра"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://si.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E0%B6%A0%E0%B6%B1%E0%B7%8A%E0%B6%AF%E0%B7%8A%E2%80%8D%E0%B6%BB%E0%B7%8F_%E0%B7%80%E0%B7%92%E0%B6%9A%E0%B7%8A%E2%80%8D%E0%B6%BB%E0%B6%B8%E0%B7%83%E0%B7%92%E0%B6%82%E0%B7%84"
    title: "චන්ද්‍රා වික්‍රමසිංහ"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://ta.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E0%AE%9A%E0%AE%A8%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%A4%E0%AE%BF%E0%AE%B0_%E0%AE%B5%E0%AE%BF%E0%AE%95%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%B0%E0%AE%AE%E0%AE%9A%E0%AE%BF%E0%AE%99%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%95%E0%AF%87"
    title: "சந்திர விக்ரமசிங்கே"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
  - url: "https://es.wikiquote.org/wiki/Chandra_Wickramasinghe"
    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
  - url: "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q765741"
    title: "Wikidata"
    type:  "WIKIDATA"

# bio (long form, separated for readability)
bio: |
  Imported from discovery source: wikidata-dump