Dr. C. E. Guillaume

Abstract

THE degree of doctor honoris causa of the University of Paris was conferred on M. C. E. Guillaume, director of the Bureau international des Poids et Mesures at Sevres, on November 10, in course of the annual meeting held at the reopening of the University, with M. Charlety, the rector, presiding. The inauguration address was read by the dean of the faculty of sciences, Prof. Maurain. M. Guillaume, a Swiss citizen, has been doing work in France for nearly fifty years at the Bureau international, first as assistant, and for twenty years as director. A fervent metrologist, M. Guillaume has fostered every improvement likely to increase the accuracy of the measurements. His painstaking investigations in thermometry and in the measurement of length made him look for possibilities of diminishing the effects of temperature. Hence followed a laborious research on special alloys, which led to the discovery of his famous ‘invar’, a nickel alloy of which the coefficient of expansion is practically negligible. But metrology did not monopolise M. Guillaume's thoughts. A good many people have enjoyed reading his “Initiation a la mecanique”, a pleasant booklet reflecting the leading ideas in physics at the beginning of the twentieth century. Besides purely scientific work, M. Guillaume has done much to further the use of the metric system, as a means to ensure international collaboration. As the Director of the Bureau international, created in 1875, M. Guillaume has had the satisfaction of seeing the system adopted even in oriental countries such as the U.S.S.R., Japan, Turkey, Persia, Afghanistan, Siam, Iraq and China. His report to the International Conference of Weights and Measures in 1933 dealt with the “Recent Progress of the Metric System” and raises the hope of the early and universal adoption of this system.