In 1924, motivated by a work of S. Bose on the black-body radiation problem, A. Einstein wrote a series of three articles where he derived the thermodynamic properties of an ideal quantum gas. In the second article, published in January 1925, Einstein predicted the "condensation" of the noninteracting atoms into the ground state after a certain density threshold had been reached. This phenomenon came to be known as Bose-Einstein Condensation (BEC). In this article, the first of a sequel, I discuss Bose's paper in detail and the implications the method he developed had on Einstein's work. In a forthcoming article Einstein's contributions will be discussed.
statistical mechanics; Bose-Einstein condensation; history of Physics
