Pierre-Gilles de Gennes
24 October 1932 – 18 May 2007
Pierre-Gilles de Gennes was a French physicist who showed that methods developed for simple systems could be generalised to more complex forms of matter, particularly liquid crystals and polymers. He received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1991 for this work. He held a chair at the Collège de France and directed the École supérieure de physique et de chimie industrielles in Paris for more than twenty-five years.
Lived at the same time
Well-documented people whose lives overlapped with Pierre-Gilles de Gennes.
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- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918–2008) Overlapped 75 years →
- Alice Munro (1931–2024) Overlapped 75 years →
- Arthur C. Clarke (1917–2008) Overlapped 75 years →
- Atal Bihari Vajpayee (1924–2018) Overlapped 75 years →
- Athol Fugard (1932–2025) Overlapped 75 years →
Life events
Born in Paris and educated at home for much of his childhood.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgEntered the school in 1951 and studied physics there for several years.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgStudied neutron scattering and magnetism at the Commissariat à l'énergie atomique.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgWorked with Charles Kittel before returning to France for military service in the navy.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgBuilt a group working on superconductivity and, later, on liquid crystals.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgDirected research that established much of the modern theory of liquid crystal phases.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgHeld the position while also working on polymer physics and wetting phenomena.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgLed the École supérieure de physique et de chimie industrielles de la ville de Paris until 2002.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgRecognised for discovering that methods for studying order in simple systems could be generalised to liquid crystals and polymers.
Source: en.wikipedia.org