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Authorised form of nameGay-Lussac; Joseph Louis (1778 - 1850)
Other forms of nameJoseph Louis Gay-
Other forms of surnameLussac
Dates1778 - 1850
NationalityFrench
Place of birthSt Leonard, France
Date of birth06 December 1778
Place of deathParis, France
Date of death09 May 1850
Research fieldChemistry
Physics
ActivityEducation:
Ecole Polytechnique, Paris; Ecole des Ponts et Chaussees
Career:
Began researches on vapour, temperature and terrestrial magnetism; discovered the Law of volumes (1808); Professor of Physics, Sorbonne, Paris (1808-1832); made balloon ascents, including one with J B Biot (FRS 1815) (1804); ascended Vesuvius when it was erupting (1805); Superintendent if the Government manufactory of Gunpowder (1818); represented Haute Vienne in the Chamber of Deputies (1831); Peer of France (1839)
Membership categoryForeign Member
Date of election06/04/1815
RelationshipsSon of Antoine Gay, procureur du Roi, who assumed name of Lussac from a property he held near St Leonard
SourceSources:
Bulloch's Roll; DSB
Obituaries:
Proc Roy Soc 1850 No 76 pp 1013-1023 [in French]
References:
C W P MacArthur, 'Davy's Differences With Gay-Lussac and Thenard: New Light on Events in Paris and on the Transmission and Translation of Davy's Papers in 1810' in NR 1984-85 vol 39 pp 207-228
B Heap, 'From the dust of the Earth? Things come to life: spontaneous generation revisited by Henry Harris' in NR 2003 vol 57 pp 107-108
D Knight, 'Test of time. Gay Lussac: scientist and bourgeois, by M Crosland' in NR 2004 vol 58 pp 315-316
Notes:
Obituary is in French
CodeNA7195
Archives associated with this Fellow
RefNoTitleDate
M/081Gay-Lussac, Joseph Louis
CB/1/1/233Letter from Claude Louis Berthollet to Charles Blagden1 January 1810
MM/1/7Letter from John Dalton, Manchester, to Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac5 Aug 1833
IM/001623Gay-Lussac, Joseph Louisnd
CB/1/1/231Letter from Claude Louis Berthollet to Charles Blagden9 July 1809
CB/1/1/227Letter from Claude Louis Berthollet to Charles Blagden31 August 1808
CB/1/1/224Letter from Claude Louis Berthollet, Arcueil to Charles Blagden20 March 1808
NLB/2/754Copy letter from Herbert Rix, to Emmett, 49 Linver Road, Hurlington30 October 1888
EC/1814/37Gay-Lussac, Joseph Louis: certificate of election to the Royal Society
CB/1/1/225Letter from Claude Louis Berthollet, Arcueil to Charles Blagden20 June 1808
AP/32/3Unpublished paper, 'Notice sur [Joseph Louis] Gay-Lussac' [A notice on Gay-Lussac] by Jean Baptiste BiotMay 1850
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