Fresnel, AUGUST IN

JEAN, F.R.S., 1788-1827. French physicist; Academician 1823. His researches in optics began ab. 1814. The wave theory of light was extended to a large cla of optical phenomena and permanently established by his discoveries and mathematical deductions. He received high compliments from Arago, Laplace, and Biot. His papers, pub. in the memoirs of the Academy Academy of Sciences, the bulletins of the Société Philomatique, and the Annales de Chimie, were collected 1866-70.