Belgian physicist and mathematician – Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau is best known for his experiments in the field of physics and mathematics. He was born in the family of an artist – Antoine Plateau. He was the one who discovered a device called phenakistoscope and laid the foundations of film, television and animated gifs and therefore known as the ” father of film”. Olivia Huynh created a special doodle on the 218th birthday of Plateau that showed his artworks. Let’s have a look at other factors of Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau’s life.
Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau Early life.
Plateau hails from Brussels. During his primary schooling days, Plateau had a great interest in the field of literature from just six years of age. He had a great interest in the experiments of physics and vowed to reveal their facts in his life. Plateau suffered a great loss at the age of sixteen when both of his parents died.
Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau Academic career.
After his parent’s death, all the responsibilities of his sister came on his shoulders. Plateau then decided to pursue his graduation from the University of Liege wherein the field of mathematics and physics. To fulfil his responsibilities for his sister Joséphine, Plateau worked as a teacher in “Atheneum” school in Brussels. After that, he worked as a teacher of applied physics at Ghent University.
Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau Personal Facts
Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau married the love of his life – Augustine- Thérèse- Fanny Clavareau on the 27th of August 1840 and together they had three children – two sons named Félix and Ernest, and a daughter named Alice. In 1871, Plateau’s daughter Alice married Gustave Van der Mensbrugghe. Later on, Gustave Van der Mensbrugghe – Alice’s husband became Plateau’s collaborator.
Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau works
Best of his works include phenakistoscope – a device that helps images to move. A total of two disks with one small window was arranged in such a way that it showed moving images when rotated in the correct format. He invented this device in 1832. Plateau lost his eyesight when he was conducting an experiment in which he looked directly at the sun for about a few seconds.
In 1840, Plateau worked on another experiment which was later known as Plateau’s problem. The experiment began when a servant added oil to the mixture of alcohol and water. As soon as the addition took place, Plateau observed spheres of oil. He then started to identify the reason behind this effect by taking the same mixture and continued dropping oil to it. In this way, he studied phenomena of capillary action and surface tension.
Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau lost his life in the city of Ghent in Belgium on the 15th of September, 1883.
Wrapping up.
So this was all about the life of Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau. Apart from all his various works, he was elected as one of the members of the Royal Belgium Academy of Science and then as a foreign member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1872. Due to his amazing research works, he was honoured twice with a quinquennial award for Mathematics and physics. We hope this article gave a better understanding of Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau’s life.