Andr Broca

Vocation

French physicist and physician. Elie André Broca was the son of the anthropologist, anatomist and surgeon Paul Broca (1824-1880) and Augustine Lignol (1834-1914). His brother Auguste (1859-1924) was a surgeon. After studying at the École polytechnique from 1883 to 1885, he became a military officer of artillery. After three years he left to take a job at the physical lab of the of the Medical faculty of the University of Paris in 1889. He also studied medicine, became a medical doctor in 1893 and in 1898 he got a medical degree (Agrégation) in physical sciences. In 1902 he became a tutor at the École polytechnique. Together with Philibert Pellin he invented in 1899 the Pellin–Broca prism still used in spectroscopy. During the Great War he worked on the "sauterelle d’Imphy", medieval cross bows that threw modern grenades. His prisms could be used in periscopes. In 1920 he got a professor chair in physical medicine and worked at the Saint-Louis hospital. He became a teacher at the Institut d'optique Graduate School. He became a member of the Academy of science in 1921. Personal In 1890 he married Jenny Laure Blondel (1865-1943). They got two daughters (1892, 1895). He died 23 (or 24?) February 1925 at Paris, 62 years old. Link to French Wikipedia