Aryabhatta (A.D. 476-550) was an Indian astronomer, mathematician, and poet. He may have been born near the South Gujarat-North Maharashtra region of central India. He probably studied in Kusumapura, now called Patna, in the Indian state of Bihar. He stated that Earth is a sphere, and he suggested that it revolves on its axis and moves around the sun. In mathematics, Aryabhatta knew how to work out cube roots. He calculated the value of pi to be 3.1416. Pi is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. Aryabhatta also advanced a theory of how eclipses take place. His most famous surviving work is the astronomy text Aryabhatiya. Two other works have been lost over time. India’s first satellite, launched in 1975, was named after him.
