A minor planet in the solar system (5178 No CD4) has been named after Kollam (Kerala) based Professor, Sainudeen Pattazhy. The honor has been given to him in admiration of his environmental research and campaigns. He was informed about this by Jet Propulsions Laboratory of the California Institute of Technology. Pattazhy was highly surprised when he was informed about it. He teaches zoology in a local college and has carried out extensive research on many environment related issues such as 'red rain', control of mosquitoes and health hazards caused by mobile phone towers.

 

His suggestions on health hazards are still pending with the Union Ministry of Environment. The minor planet was discovered in 1989 by Dr. R. Rajmohan, an US based space scientist. Sainudeen sounded very excited as such an honor has brought his remote village into limelight. He also expressed his gratitude to NASA for recognizing his work. There are about 400,000 minor planets in the solar system out of which 185,685 have already been numbered by the International Astronomical union. Around 14,000 of them have been given names. Meanwhile Pattazhy said that he has absolutely no idea why he was chosen and believes that the discoverer of the planet has suggested his name after going through his work.