Perrin, Jean

(1870-1942)

   physicist, Nobel laureate

   Born in Lille, Jean Perrin was one of the promoters of atomic theory, although more from the conceptual than the experimental viewpoint. His studies (1895) proving that cathodic rays are constituted of corpuscles carrying a negative electric charge put an end to the controversy over the existence of the electron. His research on the sedimentation of colloidal solutions and Brownian motion would yield differing results, all very precise and always in agreement with the determination of the Avogadro number, and offered new and irrefutable proof of the existence of atoms (1908). Perrin also worked on x rays and conduction through gases, and contributed to the development of scientific knowledge by the creation of the Center for Research (palais de la Découverte) in Paris (1937), and his participation in the founding of the Centre nationale de la recherce scientifique. Perrin was named to the Academy of Sciences in 1923 and was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics in 1926.