Pierre-Gilles de Gennes died four days ago. He was a French physicist and Nobel laureate.
From Wikipedia,
His Nobel Prize was awarded for “discovering that methods developed for studying order phenomena in simple systems can be generalized to more complex forms of matter, in particular to liquid crystals and polymer”
When I was a student at the INSA de Lyon, he once came (I think it was in 1997) to explain precisely what this meant:
“Bubbles!”
Yes. Pierre-Gilles de Gennes spent his time trying to understand what bubbles really were and how they were formed. He told us that it was important to know this, for example, in order to build safe factories for chemical products.
What impressed me most on that day was how passionate he was for his bubbles. And I guess he had an influence on me and that’s why I am so passionate for the things I like…
(Photo by AP Photo/Remy de la Mauviniere)
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May 22nd, 2007 at 21:04
like..?
May 22nd, 2007 at 22:08
Like programming, teaching, music, photography, blogging, etc.
But first and foremost my family
May 23rd, 2007 at 09:54
mes condoleances
que son ame repose en paix
May 23rd, 2007 at 09:55
like..?
Lmao this is simple to know.. just wait to see when his eyes glow!
May 24th, 2007 at 03:40
by the way, I modified the wikipedia article to add the less nebulous definition of his work proof…
but those damn stuck up wikipedians reverted it. just a few simple words… yet they won’t let the old man have his bubbles. He’ll only be remembered as just another Nobel prize for some obscurely complicated stuff. In fact he won’t even be remembered because it is so obscurely complicated when put in its obscurely complicated form. Sad thing indeed…
Wikipedia has too much power