Maurice, 6th duc de Broglie
Louis-César-Victor-Maurice, 6th duc de Broglie, generally known as
Maurice de Broglie (
April 27,
1875–
July 14,
1960), was a
French physicist.
He was born in
Paris, the son of
Victor, 5th duc de Broglie. In
1901, he was married to
Camille Bernou de Rochetaillée (
1888—
1966) in Paris. They had one daughter, Laure, born on
17 November 1904, who died, aged six, on
12 June 1911.He acceded to the title of
duc de Broglie on his father's death in
1906. He died on
14 July 1960 in
Neuilly-sur-Seine (
Hauts-de-Seine). His only child having died almost a half-century before, his brother
Louis succeeded him as duke.
Having graduated from naval officer's school, Maurice de Broglie spent nine years in the
French Navy, serving on a gunboat at
Bizerte and in the
Mediterranean Squadron. While serving, he became interested in physics, and began doing research on
electromagnetism. Broglie defied his family's wishes and left the navy in
1904 to pursue a scientific career. He studied under
Paul Langevin at the
Collège de France in
Paris, receiving his
doctorate in
1908.
Broglie made advances in the study of
X-ray diffraction and
spectroscopy. During the
First World War, he worked on
radio communications for the navy. After the war, he resumed his research at a large laboratory in his home. He occasionally collaborated with his younger brother
Louis, who followed his professional lead and was training as a physicist, and they coauthored a paper in
1921. After Louis de Broglie's rise to prominence in the
1920s, building on some of their shared research, the elder Broglie physicist continued his own research. While Louis was primarily a theoretician, Maurice himself was always the experimental physicist
par excellence.He became a member of the
Académie des sciences in
1924, and in
1934 was elected to the
Académie française, replacing the historian
Pierre de La Gorce. In
1942 he succeeded his mentor, assuming Langevin's chair in physics at the Collège de France. He was also elected to the
Royal Society of London on
23 May 1940, having received the Royal Society's
Hughes Medal in
1928.
*
Les Immortels: Maurice de BROGLIE (in
French)
*
Paul Theroff (2005) An Online Gotha: Broglie Genealogy
