Hélène Bouchiat (born 1958) is a French condensed matter physicist specializing in

mesoscopic physics Mesoscopic physics is a subdiscipline of condensed matter physics that deals with materials of an intermediate size. These materials range in size between the nanoscale for a quantity of atoms (such as a molecule) and of materials measuring micr ...

and

nanoscience The nanoscopic scale (or nanoscale) usually refers to structures with a length scale applicable to nanotechnology, usually cited as 1–100 nanometers (nm). A nanometer is a billionth of a meter. The nanoscopic scale is (roughly speaking) a lo ...

. She is a director of research in the

French National Centre for Scientific Research The French National Centre for Scientific Research (french: link=no, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe. In 2016, it employed 31,637 ...

(CNRS), associated with the Laboratoire de Physique des Solides at

Paris-Sud University Paris-Sud University (French: ''Université Paris-Sud''), also known as University of Paris — XI (or as Université d'Orsay before 1971), was a French research university distributed among several campuses in the southern suburbs of Paris, in ...

. Topics in her research include

supercurrent A supercurrent is a superconducting current, that is, electric current which flows without dissipation in a superconductor. Under certain conditions, an electric current can also flow without dissipation in microscopically small non-superconductin ...

persistent current In physics, persistent current refers to a perpetual electric current, not requiring an external power source. Such a current is impossible in normal electrical devices, since all commonly-used conductors have a non-zero resistance, and this resist ...

graphene Graphene () is an allotrope of carbon consisting of a single layer of atoms arranged in a hexagonal lattice nanostructure.

carbon nanotube A scanning tunneling microscopy image of a single-walled carbon nanotube Rotating single-walled zigzag carbon nanotube A carbon nanotube (CNT) is a tube made of carbon with diameters typically measured in nanometers. ''Single-wall carbon na ...

s, and bismuth-based topological insulators.

Education and career

Bouchiat is the daughter of physicists

Marie-Anne Bouchiat Marie-Anne Bouchiat-Guiochon (born 1934) is a French experimental atomic physicist whose research has included studies of neutral currents, parity violation, and hyperpolarization. She is an honorary director of research for the French Nationa ...

and

Claude Bouchiat Claude Bouchiat, born 16 May 1932, is a French physicist, member of the French Academy of sciences. Biography Graduate of the École Polytechnique in 1955, he was director of research at the CNRS in the theoretical physics laboratory of the � ...

, and was a student at the

École normale supérieure École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...

. Her 1986 doctoral dissertation, ''Transition verre de spin : comportement critique et bruit magnétique'', was supervised by at Paris-Sud University. With the exception of an 18-month postdoctoral research visit at

Bell Labs Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984), then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996) and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007), is an American industrial research and scientific development company owned by mult ...

, she has spent her entire career with the CNRS.

Recognition

Bouchiat is a member of the

French Academy of Sciences The French Academy of Sciences (French: ''Académie des sciences'') is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV of France, Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific me ...

, elected in 2010. The academy also gave her their Anatole and Suzanne Abragam Prize in 1994, and their in 1998. She won the CNRS bronze and silver medals in 1987 and 2007 respectively.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bouchiat, Helene 1958 births Living people French physicists French women physicists Condensed matter physicists Members of the French Academy of Sciences Research directors of the French National Centre for Scientific Research