Plateau

Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau

Born: 14 Oct 1801 in Brussels, Belgium
Died: 15 Sept 1883 in Ghent, Belgium

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Joseph Plateau was a physicist who is best remembered in mathematics for Plateau Problems. He used a solution of soapy water and glycerine and dipped wire contours into it, noting that the surfaces formed were minimal surfaces.

Plateau did not have the mathematical skills to investigate the problem theoretically but Weierstrass, Riemann and Schwarz worked on the problem which was finally solved by Douglas and Radó. Plateau wrote some mathematical work on number theory and wrote a joint article with Quetelet.

He was blind for the last 40 years of his life after he experimented by staring at the Sun for 25 seconds.

References elsewhere in this archive:

Plateau worked on the Plateau Curves

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. C Bergmans, Joseph Plateau, Biographie nationale 17 (1903), 768-788.
  3. T M Rassias (ed.), The Problem of Plateau - A tribute to Jesse Douglas and Tibor Radó (Singapore, 1992). 
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JOC/EFR February 1996