Jean Léonard Marie Poiseuille (22 April 1797
– 26 December 1869) was a French
physicist
A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...
and
physiologist
Physiology (; ) is the scientific study of functions and mechanisms in a living system. As a subdiscipline of biology, physiology focuses on how organisms, organ systems, individual organs, cells, and biomolecules carry out chemical and ...
.
Life
Poiseuille was born and died in Paris.
From 1815 to 1816, he studied at the
École Polytechnique
(, ; also known as Polytechnique or l'X ) is a ''grande école'' located in Palaiseau, France. It specializes in science and engineering and is a founding member of the Polytechnic Institute of Paris.
The school was founded in 1794 by mat ...
in Paris, where He was trained in
physics
Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...
and
mathematics
Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...
.
In 1828, he earned his
D.Sc. degree with a dissertation entitled ''Recherches sur la force du coeur aortique'' (The force of the aortic heart). He was interested in the flow of
human blood in narrow tubes, and invented the U-tube mercury
manometer
Pressure measurement is the measurement of an applied force by a fluid (liquid or gas) on a surface. Pressure is typically measured in units of force per unit of surface area. Many techniques have been developed for the measurement of pressu ...
(or hemodynamometer) to measure
arterial blood pressures in horses and dogs.
In 1838, he experimentally derived, and in 1840 and 1846 formulated and published, Poiseuille's law (now commonly known as the
Hagen–Poiseuille equation, crediting
Gotthilf Hagen as well), which applies to
laminar flow, that is, non-turbulent flow of liquids through pipes of uniform section, such as blood flow in
capillaries and
veins. The
poise, the unit of
viscosity
Viscosity is a measure of a fluid's rate-dependent drag (physics), resistance to a change in shape or to movement of its neighboring portions relative to one another. For liquids, it corresponds to the informal concept of ''thickness''; for e ...
in the
CGS system, was named after him; a proposed
SI unit for viscosity, the
poiseuille, was also named in his honour.
Notes
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Poiseuille, Jean Leonard Marie
1797 births
1869 deaths
19th-century French physicians
French fluid dynamicists
French physiologists