PHYSICIST

Léon Foucault

1819 - 1868

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Jean Bernard Léon Foucault (UK: , US: ; French: [ʒɑ̃ bɛʁnaʁ leɔ̃ fuko]; 18 September 1819 – 11 February 1868) was a French physicist best known for his demonstration of the Foucault pendulum, a device demonstrating the effect of Earth's rotation. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Léon Foucault has received more than 433,617 page views. His biography is available in 70 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 68 in 2019). Léon Foucault is the 48th most popular physicist (down from 37th in 2019), the 224th most popular biography from France (down from 204th in 2019) and the 7th most popular French Physicist.

Léon Foucault is most famous for his pendulum experiment. He used a pendulum to demonstrate the rotation of the Earth.

Memorability Metrics

  • 430k

    Page Views (PV)

  • 73.03

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 70

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 14.64

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 2.76

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Among PHYSICISTS

Among physicists, Léon Foucault ranks 48 out of 851. Before him are Max von Laue, Pieter Zeeman, J. J. Thomson, Philipp Lenard, William Gilbert, and Frédéric Joliot-Curie. After him are Christian Doppler, Barry Barish, William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin, Johannes Diderik van der Waals, Wilhelm Wien, and Ernst Mach.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1819, Léon Foucault ranks 5. Before him are Queen Victoria, Gustave Courbet, Jacques Offenbach, and Clara Schumann. After him are Herman Melville, Albert, Prince Consort, Walt Whitman, Sir George Stokes, 1st Baronet, Báb, Hippolyte Fizeau, and Maria II of Portugal. Among people deceased in 1868, Léon Foucault ranks 2. Before him is Gioachino Rossini. After him are James Buchanan, August Ferdinand Möbius, Ludwig I of Bavaria, Mongkut, August Schleicher, Alexandre Colonna-Walewski, Okita Sōji, William T. G. Morton, Mihailo Obrenović, and David Brewster.

Others Born in 1819

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Others Deceased in 1868

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In France

Among people born in France, Léon Foucault ranks 224 out of 6,770. Before him are Gilles Deleuze (1925), Pope Innocent VI (1282), Gustave Le Bon (1841), Hortense de Beauharnais (1783), Frédéric Joliot-Curie (1900), and Gustave Doré (1832). After him are Bernard Arnault (1949), François Boucher (1703), Pope Urban VI (1318), Philip V of France (1293), Christian Dior (1905), and Antoine Meillet (1866).

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Among PHYSICISTS In France

Among physicists born in France, Léon Foucault ranks 7. Before him are Pierre Curie (1859), Henri Becquerel (1852), André-Marie Ampère (1775), Charles-Augustin de Coulomb (1736), Henry Cavendish (1731), and Frédéric Joliot-Curie (1900). After him are Gaspard-Gustave de Coriolis (1792), Louis de Broglie (1892), Hans Bethe (1906), Jean Baptiste Perrin (1870), François Arago (1786), and Alfred Kastler (1902).

French born Physicists

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