he is a French subject

1. noun

   a. ( = matter, topic, person) sujet m (of, for de ) ; (studied at school or university) matière f

• to get off the subject sortir du sujet

• that's off the subject c'est hors sujet

• let's get back to the subject revenons à nos moutons

• let's change the subject changeons de sujet

• English is his best subject l'anglais est sa matière forte

► on the subject of... au sujet de...

• while we're on the subject of... pendant que nous parlons de...

   b. ( = citizen) sujet (te) m(f)

• British subject sujet m britannique

• he is a French subject il est de nationalité française

2. adjective

   a. subject to ( = prone to) sujet à

• the area is subject to drought la région est sujette à la sécheresse

• subject to French rule sous domination française

• your gift will be subject to VAT votre cadeau sera soumis à la TVA

   b. subject to the approval of the committee ( = depending on) sous réserve de l'accord du comité

• subject to certain conditions sous certaines conditions

• the decision is subject to approval/confirmation cette décision doit être approuvée/confirmée

• "subject to availability" [holiday, concert, flight] « dans la limite des places disponibles » ; [free gift] « dans la limite des stocks disponibles »

• "prices are subject to alteration" « ces prix sont sujets à modifications »

3. transitive verb

[+ country] soumettre

• to subject sb to sth faire subir qch à qn

• to subject sth to heat/cold exposer qch à la chaleur/au froid

• he was subjected to much criticism il a fait l'objet de nombreuses critiques

4. compounds

► subject heading noun rubrique f

► subject matter noun ( = theme) sujet m ; ( = content) contenu m

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✦ Lorsque subject est un nom ou un adjectif, l'accent tombe sur la première syllabe: ˈsʌbdʒɪkt, lorsque c'est un verbe, sur la seconde: səbˈdʒekt.

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1) ( topic) sujet m also Art, Photography, Linguistics

2) (at school, college) matière f; (for research, study) sujet m

3) ( focus) objet m

4) ( citizen) sujet/-ette m/f

1) ( subservient) asservi

2) ( liable)

3) ( dependent)

transitive verb ( expose)

1) (a person who is under the rule of a monarch or a member of a country that has a monarchy etc: We are loyal subjects of the Queen; He is a British subject.) podložnik

2) (someone or something that is talked about, written about etc: We discussed the price of food and similar subjects; What was the subject of the debate?; The teacher tried to think of a good subject for their essay; I've said all I can on that subject.) tema

3) (a branch of study or learning in school, university etc: He is taking exams in seven subjects; Mathematics is his best subject.) predmet

4) (a thing, person or circumstance suitable for, or requiring, a particular kind of treatment, reaction etc: I don't think her behaviour is a subject for laughter.) vzrok

5) (in English, the word(s) representing the person or thing that usually does the action shown by the verb, and with which the verb agrees: The cat sat on the mat; He hit her because she broke his toy; He was hit by the ball.) osebek

1) (to bring (a person, country etc) under control: They have subjected all the neighbouring states (to their rule).) podvreči

2) (to cause to suffer, or submit (to something): He was subjected to cruel treatment; These tyres are subjected to various tests before leaving the factory.) izpostaviti

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- subjection

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podložnik, podanik, državljan; predmet (stvar) pogovora, téma; učni predmet; music téma; razlog, povod, vzrok, motiv ( for za); človek, oseba; grammar osebek, subjekt; philosophy ego; poskusni predmet (oseba, žival); mrlič (za seciranje); medicine oseba, pacient

on the subject of — gledé, kar se tiče, kar zadeva

a subject for complaint — razlog za pritožbo

the subject of ridicule — predmet posmehovanja

compulsory (optional, additional) subject — obvezen (izbiren, dodaten) učni predmet

a hysterical subject — histerična oseba (pacient)

a nervous subject — živčna oseba, živčnež

the liberty of the subject — državljanska svoboda

a ticklish subject — kočljiv, delikaten predmet

he is a French subject — on je francoski državljan

there is no subject for joking — ni nobenega razloga za zbijanje šal

to change the subject — menjati témo (razgovora)

to drop a subject — opustiti razgovor o nekem predmetu

to wander from the subject — oddaljiti se od predmeta;

podvržen, podložen, podrejen (to komu, čemu), odvisen (to od); nesamostojen (država itd.); občutljiv (to za), nagnjen (to k), izpostavljen (to čemu)

subject to — pogojèn z, s pogojem; odvisen od (česa), s pridržkom

subject to his consent — če on privoli

subject to your approval — s pogojem (pridržkom), da vi odobrite

subject to duty — podvržen carini

subject to ridicule — izpostavljen posmehu

I am subject to indigestion — podvržen sem prebavnim motnjam

the treaty is subject to ratification — pogodba mora biti ratificirana, da postane veljavna

she is subject to headaches — ona je nagnjena h glavobolom

to hold subject — imeti v podložnosti, v odvisnosti

to be held subject — biti odvisen

podvreči, podrediti; podjarmiti; napraviti odvisno (to od); izpostaviti (to čemu); obrzdati; napraviti dovzetnega za

to subject a country to one's way — podjarmiti si deželo

you must subject it to analysis — to morate analizirati

to subject o.s. to ridicule — izpostavljati se posmehu

I don't want to subject myself to his criticism — ne maram se izpostavljati njegovi kritiki

he had been subjected to a lot of suffering — mnogo je pretrpel

to subject s.o. to a test — preskusiti koga

1. n

1) предмет (розмови); питання; тема

2) сюжет, тема

3) (навчальний) предмет, дисципліна

4) об'єкт, предмет

5) привід

6) підданий

7) суб'єкт, людина

8) мед. труп (під час розтину)

9) грам. підмет

10) філос. суб'єкт

11) муз. тема

2. adj

1) підкорений, залежний, підвладний

2) схильний (до чогось — to)

3) (to) залежний (від чогось); зумовлений (чимсь); який підлягає (чомусь), який має бути здійснений

4) розташований нижче

1) підкоряти, підпорядковувати (комусь, чомусь — to)

2) піддавати (чомусь — to)

3) представляти, подавати

4) поставати перед очима

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1) предмет, тема ( розмови); сюжет, тема

2) предмет, дисципліна

3) об'єкт, предмет; мeд. труп ( при розтині)

4) привід, підстава

5) підданий

6) суб'єкт, людина

7) гpaм. підмет

8) фiлoc., юp. суб'єкт; субстанція, реальність

9) мyз. тема

1) підлеглий, залежний, підвладний

2) (to) підданий ( чому-небудь), схильний ( до чого-небудь)

3) (to) підлягаючий ( чому-небудь); залежний ( від чого-небудь), обумовлений ( чим-небудь)

4) інформ. предметний

1) підкоряти

2) піддавати ( чому-небудь)

3) представляти (нaпp., на розгляд)

1) (a person who is under the rule of a monarch or a member of a country that has a monarchy etc: We are loyal subjects of the Queen; He is a British subject.) súbdito

2) (someone or something that is talked about, written about etc: We discussed the price of food and similar subjects; What was the subject of the debate?; The teacher tried to think of a good subject for their essay; I've said all I can on that subject.) tema, asunto

3) (a branch of study or learning in school, university etc: He is taking exams in seven subjects; Mathematics is his best subject.) asignatura

4) (a thing, person or circumstance suitable for, or requiring, a particular kind of treatment, reaction etc: I don't think her behaviour is a subject for laughter.) motivo

5) (in English, the word(s) representing the person or thing that usually does the action shown by the verb, and with which the verb agrees: The cat sat on the mat; He hit her because she broke his toy; He was hit by the ball.) sujeto

1) (to bring (a person, country etc) under control: They have subjected all the neighbouring states (to their rule).) dominar, subyugar

2) (to cause to suffer, or submit (to something): He was subjected to cruel treatment; These tyres are subjected to various tests before leaving the factory.) someter

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- subjection

subject n

1. asignatura

2. tema

3. súbdito

4. sujeto

tr[ (n-adj) 'sʌbʤekt; (vb) səb'ʤekt]

noun

1 (theme, topic) tema nombre masculino

■ what's your opinion on the subject? ¿qué opinas del tema?

■ while we're on the subject of money ya que hablamos de dinero

2 SMALLEDUCATION/SMALL asignatura

3 (citizen) súbdito, ciudadano,-a

4 SMALLLINGUISTICS/SMALL sujeto

5 (cause) objeto (of/for, de)

6 (of experiment) sujeto

transitive verb

1 (bring under control) someter, sojuzgar (to, a)

adjective

1 (subordinate, governed) sometido,-a

1 subject to (bound by) sujeto,-a a

■ we are all subject to the law todos estamos sujetos a la ley

1 subject to (prone to - floods, subsidence) expuesto,-a a; (- change, delay) susceptible de, sujeto,-a a; (- illness) propenso,-a a

preposition subject to

1 (conditional on) previo,-a, supeditado,-a a

■ subject to approval previa aprobación

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to change the subject cambiar de tema

subject matter (topic) tema nombre masculino, materia 2 (contents) contenido

subject [səb'ʤɛkt] vt

1) control, dominate: controlar, dominar

2) : someter

they subjected him to pressure: lo sometieron a presiones

subject ['sʌbʤɪkt] adj

1) : subyugado, sometido

a subject nation: una nación subyugada

2) prone: sujeto, propenso

subject to colds: sujeto a resfriarse

subject to : sujeto a

subject to congressional approval: sujeto a la aprobación del congreso

subject ['sʌbʤɪkt] n

1) : súbdito m, -ta f (de un gobierno)

2) topic: tema m

3) : sujeto m (en gramática)

• asunto, -a adj.

• materia adj.

• subyugado, -a adj.

• sujeto, -a adj.

• súbdito, -a adj.

• tema adj.

• asunto s.m.

• capítulo s.m.

• lectura s.f.

• materia s.f.

• sujeto s.m.

• súbdito s.m.

• tema s.m.

• avasallar v.

• dominar v.

• someter v.

• sujetar v.

• supeditar v.

1) ( topic) tema m

2) ( discipline) asignatura f, materia f (esp AmL), ramo m (Chi)

3) ( Pol) súbdito, -ta m,f

4) ( Ling) sujeto m

1) ( owing obedience) <people/nation/province> sometido

2)

a) (liable, prone)

b) ( conditional upon)

1) ( force to undergo)

2) ( make submissive) \<\<nation/people\>\> someter, sojuzgar*

1. ['sʌbdʒɪkt]

1) (=topic, theme) tema m ; (=plot) argumento m, asunto m

2) (Scol, Univ) asignatura f

3) (Gram) sujeto m

4) (Med) caso m

5) (Sci)

6) (esp Brit) (Pol) súbdito(-a) m / f

2. ['sʌbdʒɪkt]

1) [people, nation] dominado, subyugado

2)

[sǝb'dʒekt]

['sʌbdʒɪkt]

* * *

1) ( topic) tema m

2) ( discipline) asignatura f, materia f (esp AmL), ramo m (Chi)

3) ( Pol) súbdito, -ta m,f

4) ( Ling) sujeto m

1) ( owing obedience) <people/nation/province> sometido

2)

a) (liable, prone)

b) ( conditional upon)

1) ( force to undergo)

2) ( make submissive) \<\<nation/people\>\> someter, sojuzgar*

1) Глаголы appear - выглядеть, seem - казаться, prove - оказываться, happen - случаться, turn out - оказываться употребляются в конструкции со сложным подлежащим (см. Complex subject). Первая часть сложного подлежащего представляет собой существительное или местоимение в общем падеже, а вторая — инфинитив с частицей to (To-infinitive).

2) После глаголов appear, seem можно поставить косвенное дополнение с предлогом to.

3)

а) После глаголов prove, turn out глагол-связка be часто опускается, когда за ними следует прилагательное или существительное с прилагательным.

б) Если после глаголов prove, turn out следует существительное без прилагательного, то глагол be не может быть опущен.

4) После глаголов seem и appear может идти существительное, прилагательное или существительное с прилагательным без глагола-связки be. В этом случае глаголы seem и appear обычно переводятся на русский язык с помощью глагола выглядеть или сочетания производить впечатление.

5) Глаголы appear, seem, prove, happen могут употребляться в предложениях со словами it и there в функции формального подлежащего (см. Empty subject: "it" and "there")

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SUBJECT AREA: Metallurgy

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Soon after graduating from the Ecole des Mines at St-Etienne in 1910, Chevenard joined the Société de Commentry Fourchambault et Decazeville at their steelworks at Imphy, where he remained for the whole of his career. Imphy had for some years specialized in the production of nickel steels. From this venture emerged the first austenitic nickel-chromium steel, containing 6 per cent chromium and 22–4 per cent nickel and produced commercially in 1895. Most of the alloys required by Guillaume in his search for the low-expansion alloy Invar were made at Imphy. At the Imphy Research Laboratory, established in 1911, Chevenard conducted research into the development of specialized nickel-based alloys. His first success followed from an observation that some of the ferro-nickels were free from the low-temperature brittleness exhibited by conventional steels. To satisfy the technical requirements of Georges Claude, the French cryogenic pioneer, Chevenard was then able in 1912 to develop an alloy containing 55–60 per cent nickel, 1–3 per cent manganese and 0.2–0.4 per cent carbon. This was ductile down to −190°C, at which temperature carbon steel was very brittle.

By 1916 Elinvar, a nickel-iron-chromium alloy with an elastic modulus that did not vary appreciably with changes in ambient temperature, had been identified. This found extensive use in horology and instrument manufacture, and even for the production of high-quality tuning forks. Another very popular alloy was Platinite, which had the same coefficient of thermal expansion as platinum and soda glass. It was used in considerable quantities by incandescent-lamp manufacturers for lead-in wires. Other materials developed by Chevenard at this stage to satisfy the requirements of the electrical industry included resistance alloys, base-metal thermocouple combinations, magnetically soft high-permeability alloys, and nickel-aluminium permanent magnet steels of very high coercivity which greatly improved the power and reliability of car magnetos. Thermostatic bimetals of all varieties soon became an important branch of manufacture at Imphy.

During the remainder of his career at Imphy, Chevenard brilliantly elaborated the work on nickel-chromium-tungsten alloys to make stronger pressure vessels for the Haber and other chemical processes. Another famous alloy that he developed, ATV, contained 35 per cent nickel and 11 per cent chromium and was free from the problem of stress-induced cracking in steam that had hitherto inhibited the development of high-power steam turbines. Between 1912 and 1917, Chevenard recognized the harmful effects of traces of carbon on this type of alloy, and in the immediate postwar years he found efficient methods of scavenging the residual carbon by controlled additions of reactive metals. This led to the development of a range of stabilized austenitic stainless steels which were free from the problems of intercrystalline corrosion and weld decay that then caused so much difficulty to the manufacturers of chemical plant.

Chevenard soon concluded that only the nickel-chromium system could provide a satisfactory basis for the subsequent development of high-temperature alloys. The first published reference to the strengthening of such materials by additions of aluminium and/or titanium occurs in his UK patent of 1929. This strengthening approach was adopted in the later wartime development in Britain of the Nimonic series of alloys, all of which depended for their high-temperature strength upon the precipitated compound Ni3Al.

In 1936 he was studying the effect of what is now known as "thermal fatigue", which contributes to the eventual failure of both gas and steam turbines. He then published details of equipment for assessing the susceptibility of nickel-chromium alloys to this type of breakdown by a process of repeated quenching. Around this time he began to make systematic use of the thermo-gravimetrie balance for high-temperature oxidation studies.

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SUBJECT AREA: Mining and extraction technology, Steam and internal combustion engines

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A don of the Ecole Polytechnique and the Ecole Supérieure des Mines in Paris, Rateau joined the French Corps des Mines in 1887. Between 1888 and 1898 he taught applied mechanics and electro technics at the Ecole des Mines in St-Etienne. Trying to apply the results of his research to practise, he became into contact with commercial firms, before he was appointed Professor of Industrial Electricity at the Ecole Supérieure des Mines in Paris in 1902. He held this position until 1910, although he founded the Société Anonyme Rateau in Paris in 1903 which by the time of his death had subsidiaries in most of the industrial centres of Europe. By the middle of the nineteenth century, when the increasing problems of ventilation in coal mines had become evident and in many countries had led to several unsatisfactory mechanical constructions, Rateau concentrated on this problem soon after he began working in St-Etienne. The result of his research was the design of a centrifugal fan in 1887 with which he established the principles of mechanical ventilation on a general basis that led to future developments and helped, together with the ventilator invented by Capell in England, to pave the way for the use of electricity in mine ventilation.

Rateau continued the study of fluid mechanics and the applications of rotating engines, and after he had published widely on this subject he began to construct many steam turbines, centrifugal compressors and centrifugal pumps. The multicellular Rateau turbine of 1901 became the prototype for many others constructors. During the First World War, when he was very active in the French armaments industry, he developed the invention of the automatic supercharger for aircraft engines and later diesel engines.

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SUBJECT AREA: Medical technology, Photography, film and optics

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At the age of 19 Marey went to Paris to study medicine, becoming particularly interested in the problems of the circulation of the blood. In an early communication to the Académie des Sciences he described a much improved device for recording the pulse, the sphygmograph, in which the beats were recorded on a smoked plate. Most of his subsequent work was concerned with methods of recording movement: to study the movement of the horse, he used pneumatic sensors on each hoof to record traces on a smoked drum; this device became known as the Marey recording tambour. His attempts to study the wing movements of a bird in flight in the same way met with limited success since the recording system interfered with free movement. Reading in 1878 of Muybridge's work in America using sequence photography to study animal movement, Marey considered the use of photography himself. In 1882 he developed an idea first used by the astronomer Janssen: a camera in which a series of exposures could be made on a circular photographic plate. Marey's "photographic gun" was rifle shaped and could expose twelve pictures in approximately one second on a circular plate. With this device he was able to study wing movements of birds in free flight. The camera was limited in that it could record only a small number of images, and in the summer of 1882 he developed a new camera, when the French government gave him a grant to set up a physiological research station on land provided by the Parisian authorities near the Porte d'Auteuil. The new design used a fixed plate, on which a series of images were recorded through a rotating shutter. Looking rather like the results provided by a modern stroboscope flash device, the images were partially superimposed if the subject was slow moving, or separated if it was fast. His human subjects were dressed all in white and moved against a black background. An alternative was to dress the subject in black, with highly reflective strips and points along limbs and at joints, to produce a graphic record of the relationships of the parts of the body during action. A one-second-sweep timing clock was included in the scene to enable the precise interval between exposures to be assessed. The fixed-plate cameras were used with considerable success, but the number of individual records on each plate was still limited. With the appearance of Eastman's Kodak roll-film camera in France in September 1888, Marey designed a new camera to use the long rolls of paper film. He described the new apparatus to the Académie des Sciences on 8 October 1888, and three weeks later showed a band of images taken with it at the rate of 20 per second. This camera and its subsequent improvements were the first true cinematographic cameras. The arrival of Eastman's celluloid film late in 1889 made Marey's camera even more practical, and for over a decade the Physiological Research Station made hundreds of sequence studies of animals and humans in motion, at rates of up to 100 pictures per second. Marey pioneered the scientific study of movement using film cameras, introducing techniques of time-lapse, frame-by-frame and slow-motion analysis, macro-and micro-cinematography, superimposed timing clocks, studies of airflow using smoke streams, and other methods still in use in the 1990s. Appointed Professor of Natural History at the Collège de France in 1870, he headed the Institut Marey founded in 1898 to continue these studies. After Marey's death in 1904, the research continued under the direction of his associate Lucien Bull, who developed many new techniques, notably ultra-high-speed cinematography.

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See also: Demenÿ, Georges

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SUBJECT AREA: Land transport, Railways and locomotives

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Chapelon's technical education at the Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures, Paris, was interrupted by extended military service during the First World War. From experience of observing artillery from the basket of a captive balloon, he developed a method of artillery fire control which was more accurate than that in use and which was adopted by the French army.

In 1925 he joined the motive-power and rolling-stock department of the Paris-Orléans Railway under Chief Mechanical Engineer Maurice Lacoin and was given the task of improving the performance of its main-line 4–6–2 locomotives, most of them compounds. He had already made an intensive study of steam locomotive design and in 1926 introduced his Kylchap exhaust system, based in part on the earlier work of the Finnish engineer Kyläla. Chapelon improved the entrainment of the hot gases in the smokebox by the exhaust steam and so minimized back pressure in the cylinders, increasing the power of a locomotive substantially. He also greatly increased the cross-sectional area of steam passages, used poppet valves instead of piston valves and increased superheating of steam. PO (Paris-Orléans) 4–6–2s rebuilt on these principles from 1929 onwards proved able to haul 800-ton trains, in place of the previous 500-ton trains, and to do so to accelerated schedules with reduced coal consumption. Commencing in 1932, some were converted, at the time of rebuilding, into 4–8–0s to increase adhesive weight for hauling heavy trains over the steeply graded Paris-Toulouse line.

Chapelon's principles were quickly adopted on other French railways and elsewhere.

H.N. Gresley was particularly influenced by them. After formation of the French National Railways (SNCF) in 1938, Chapelon produced in 1941 a prototype rebuilt PO 2–10–0 freight locomotive as a six-cylinder compound, with four low-pressure cylinders to maximize expansive use of steam and with all cylinders steam-jacketed to minimize heat loss by condensation and radiation. War conditions delayed extended testing until 1948–52. Meanwhile Chapelon had, by rebuilding, produced in 1946 a high-powered, three-cylinder, compound 4–8–4 intended as a stage in development of a proposed range of powerful and thermally efficient steam locomotives for the postwar SNCF: a high-speed 4–6–4 in this range was to run at sustained speeds of 125 mph (200 km/h). However, plans for improved steam locomotives were then overtaken in France by electriflcation and dieselization, though the performance of the 4–8–4, which produced 4,000 hp (3,000 kW) at the drawbar for the first time in Europe, prompted modification of electric locomotives, already on order, to increase their power.

Chapelon retired from the SNCF in 1953, but continued to act as a consultant. His principles were incorporated into steam locomotives built in France for export to South America, and even after the energy crisis of 1973 he was consulted on projects to build improved, high-powered steam locomotives for countries with reserves of cheap coal. The eventual fall in oil prices brought these to an end.

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SUBJECT AREA: Public utilities

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Lebon was the son of a court official under Louis XV. He entered the Ecole des Ponts et Chaussées and graduated in 1792, by which time he had acquired a considerable reputation as a scientific engineer. He is credited with the invention of the firetube steam boiler and of the superheater, and he also devised an engine to work by gas, but from 1792 until his untimely death he worked mainly on his experiments to produce an inflammable gas for lighting purposes. He submitted a paper on the subject in 1799 to the Institut National and received a patent in the same year. The patent covers the detailed making and application of gas for light, heat and power, and the recovery of by-products. It describes the production of the gas by the carbonization of coal, although Lebon in feet used only wood gas for his experiments and demonstrations. He began demonstrations in a private house in Paris, but these attracted little attention. He achieved wider public interest when he moved to the Hôtel Seignelay, where he started a series of public demonstrations in 1801, but he attracted little profit, and in fact lost his money in his experiments. He then set up a plant near Rouen to manufacture wood tar, but his career was brought to an end by his brutal murder in the Champs Elysées in Paris. William Murdock was working along similar lines in England, although Lebon knew nothing of his experiments. The German entrepreneur F.A. Winsor visited Lebon and managed to discover the essentials of his processes, which he turned to good account in England with the founding of the Gas, Light \& Coke Company.

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SUBJECT AREA: Photography, film and optics

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Born of French parents, Lippman's work began with a distinguished career in classics, philosophy, mathematics and physics at the Ecole Normale in Luxembourg. After further studies in physics at Heidelberg University, he returned to France and the Sorbonne, where he was in 1886 appointed Director of Physics. He was a leading pioneer in France of research into electricity, optics, heat and other branches of physics.

In 1886 he conceived the idea of recording the existence of standing waves in light when it is reflected back on itself, by photographing the colours so produced. This required the production of a photographic emulsion that was effectively grainless: the individual silver halide crystals had to be smaller than the shortest wavelength of light to be recorded. Lippman succeeded in this and in 1891 demonstrated his process. A glass plate was coated with a grainless emulsion and held in a special plate-holder, glass towards the lens. The back of the holder was filled with mercury, which provided a perfect reflector when in contact with the emulsion. The standing waves produced during the exposure formed laminae in the emulsion, with the number of laminae being determined by the wavelength of the incoming light at each point on the image. When the processed plate was viewed under the correct lighting conditions, a theoretically exact reproduction of the colours of the original subject could be seen. However, the Lippman process remained a beautiful scientific demonstration only, since the ultra-fine-grain emulsion was very slow, requiring exposure times of over 10,000 times that of conventional negative material. Any method of increasing the speed of the emulsion also increased the grain size and destroyed the conditions required for the process to work.

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SUBJECT AREA: Aerospace

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Ader was a distinguished engineer and versatile inventor who was involved with electrical developments, including the telephone and air-cushion vehicles. In the field of aeronautics he became the centre of a long-lasting controversy: did he, or did he not, fly before the Wright brothers' flight of 1903? In 1882 Ader started work on his first aeroplane, the Eole (god of the winds), which was bat-like in appearance and powered by a very well-designed lightweight steam engine developing about 15 kW (20 hp). On 9 October 1890 the Eole was ready, and with Ader as pilot it increased speed over a level surface and lifted off the ground. It was airborne for about 5 seconds and covered some 50 m (164 ft), reaching a height of 20 cm (8 in.). Whether such a short hop constituted a flight has caused much discussion and argument over the years. An even greater controversy followed Ader's claim in 1906 that his third aeroplane (Avion III) had made a flight of 300 m (328 yd) in 1897. He repeated this claim in his book written in 1907, and many historians accepted his account of the "flight". C.H.Gibbs-Smith, an eminent aviation historian, investigated the Ader controversy and in his book published in 1966 came to the conclusion that the Avion III did not fly at all. Avion III was donated to the Museum of the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers in Paris, and still survives. From 1906 onwards Ader concentrated his inventive efforts elsewhere, but he did mount a successful campaign to persuade the French War Ministry to create an air force.

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SUBJECT AREA: Weapons and armour

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He joined the French army after the restoration of the monarchy in 1815 and rose to the rank of Captain in the Royal Guard. His main interest was in developing a more effective rifle, and in 1826 he produced a model in which the chamber was narrower than the bore. By tapping the musket ball with the ramrod, the ball could be made to fit into the grooves of the rifling, thus ensuring greater accuracy and increased effective range over previous models. The French army adopted Delvigne's rifle and used it with some success in Algeria in the 1830s. In the meantime Delvigne tried to go a stage further by designing a cylindro-conical bullet with a hollow base, which would enable it to expand into the grooves when fired, but his concept did not come to total fruition and was left to Minié to develop some twenty years later. Even so, in 1842 Delvigne completed the design of a chambered breech rifle, which was also adopted by the French army.

SUBJECT AREA: Canals

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Ferdinand de Lesseps was born into a family in the diplomatic service and it was intended that his should be his career also. He was educated at the Lycée Napoléon in Paris. In 1825, aged 20, he was appointed an attaché to the French consulate in Lisbon. In 1828 he went to the Consulate-General in Tunis and in 1831 was posted from there to Egypt, becoming French Consul in Cairo two years later. For his work there during the plague in 1836 he was awarded the Croix de Chevalier in the Légion d'honneur. During this time he became very friendly with Said Mohammed and the friendship was maintained over the years, although there were no expectations then that Said would occupy any great position of authority.

De Lesseps then served in other countries. In 1841 he had thought about a canal from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea, and he brooded over the idea until 1854. In October of that year, having retired from the diplomatic service, he returned to Egypt privately. His friend Said became Viceroy and he readily agreed to the proposal to cut the canal. At first there was great international opposition to the idea, and in 1855 de Lesseps travelled to England to try to raise capital. Work finally started in 1859, but there were further delays following the death of Said Pasha in 1863. The work was completed in 1869 and the canal was formally opened by the Empress Eugenic on 20 November 1869. De Lesseps was fêted in France and awarded the Grand Croix de la Légion d'honneur.

He subsequently promoted the project of the Corinth Canal, but his great ambition in his later years was to construct a canal across the Isthmus of Panama. This idea had been conceived by Spanish adventurers in 1514, but everyone felt the problems and cost would be too great. De Lesseps, riding high in popularity and with his charismatic character, convinced the public of the scheme's feasibility and was able to raise vast sums for the enterprise. He proposed a sea-level canal, which required the excavation of a 350 ft (107 m) cut through terrain; this eventually proved impossible, but work nevertheless started in 1881.

In 1882 de Lesseps became first President d'-Honneur of the Syndicat des Entrepreneurs de Travaux Publics de France and was elected to the Chair of the French Academy in 1884. By 1891 the Panama Canal was in a disastrous financial crisis: a new company was formed, and because of the vast sums expended a financial investigation was made. The report led to de Lesseps, his son and several high-ranking government ministers and officials being charged with bribery and corruption, but de Lesseps was a very sick man and never appeared at the trial. He was never convicted, although others were, and he died soon after, at the age of 89, at his home.

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SUBJECT AREA: Architecture and building

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Mansart was a classical architect who designed in High Renaissance style in France. Chief architect to Louis XIII, he was responsible for a number of fine châteaux and hôtels such as the Château de Maisons (1642–51) near Paris and the Hôtel Carnavalet (1660) in Paris. He was also the architect of the magnificent Paris church of Val de Grâce (begun in 1645).

The mansard roof, which has two different slopes of pitch, one steeper than the other, was named after Mansart (with a small change of spelling for euphony). It was a type of roof that was very popular in France from the early seventeenth century onwards and was revived under Napoleon III in the nineteenth century. However, although Mansart popularized this style of roof, he did not invent it; indeed, it was used in earlier works by both Pierre Lescot and Jacques Lemercier.

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SUBJECT AREA: Domestic appliances and interiors, Textiles

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The sewing machine is probably the most universal and the most important machine in clothing manufacture, being used both industrially and domestically. It was also the first domestic consumer durable and was the first mass-produced machine to appear in the home. The first practical sewing machine was built during 1828 and 1829 by Barthélémy Thimmonier, a working tailor of Saint-Etienne in France. He came from a modest family and had never received any training as a mechanic, so his invention is all the more remarkable. He took out a patent in 1830 in his own name and that of Ferrand, a tutor of the Saint-Etienne School of Mines who had helped him financially. It was a chain-stitch machine made largely of wood and operated by a foot pedal with a large flywheel. The needle moved up and down through the cloth, which was placed on a platform below it. A second, hooked needle under the platform made a loop in the thread, which was caught when the first needle descended again.

In 1841, Thimmonier was appointed to a senior position in a large Paris clothing factory engaged in the production of French army uniforms. He soon had eighty machines in use, but a mob of hand-sewers broke in, smashed the machines and nearly killed Thimmonier. In 1845, he had developed his machine so that it could make 200 stitches per minute and formed a partnership with Jean-Marie Magnin to build them commercially. However, the abdication of Louis Philippe on 21 February 1848 ended his hopes, even though patents were taken out in the UK and the USA in that year. The English patent was in Magnin's name, and Thimmonier died impoverished in 1857. His machine was perfected by many later inventors.

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SUBJECT AREA: Electronics and information technology, Telecommunications

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Baudot had no formal education beyond his local primary school and began his working life as a farmer, as was his father. However, in September 1869 he joined the French telegraph service and was soon sent on a course on the recently developed Hughes printing telegraph. After service in the Franco-Prussian war as a lieutenant with the military telegraph, he returned to his civilian duties in Paris in 1872. He was there encouraged to develop (in his own time!) a multiple Hughes system for time-multiplexing of several telegraph messages. By using synchronized clockwork-driven rotating switches at the transmitter and receiver he was able to transmit five messages simultaneously; the system was officially adopted by the French Post \& Telegraph Administration five years later. In 1874 he patented the idea of a 5-bit (i.e. 32-permutation) code, with equal on and off intervals, for telegraph transmission of the Roman alphabet and punctuation signs and for control of the typewriter-like teleprinter used to display the message. This code, known as the Baudot code, was found to be more economical than the existing Morse code and was widely adopted for national and international telegraphy in the twentieth century. In the 1970s it was superseded by 7—and 8-bit codes.

Further development of his ideas on multiplexing led in 1894 to methods suitable for high-speed telegraphy. To commemorate his contribution to efficient telegraphy, the unit of signalling speed (i.e. the number of elements transmitted per second) is known as the baud.

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SUBJECT AREA: Domestic appliances and interiors

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As with the Renaissance artists and architects of fifteenth-and sixteenth-century Italy, Boulle worked as a young man in varied media, as a painter, engraver and metalworker an in mosaic techniques. It was in the 1660s that he turned more specifically to furniture and in the following decade, under the patronage of Louis XIV, that he became a leading ébéniste or cabinet-maker, In 1672 the King's Controller-General, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, recommended Boulle as an outstanding cabinet-maker and he was appointed ébéniste du roi. From then he spent the rest of his life working in the royal palaces, notably the Louvre and Versailles, and also carried out commissions for the French aristocracy and from abroad, particularly Spain and Germany.

Before the advent of Boulle, the quality furniture made for the French court and aristocracy had come from foreign craftsmen, particularly Domenico Cucci of Italy and Pierre Colle of the Low Countries. Boulle made his name as their equal in his development of new forms of furniture such as his bureaux and commodes, the immense variety of his designs and their architectural quality, the beauty of his sculptural, gilded mounts, and the development of his elaborate marquetry. He was a leading exponent of the contemporary styles, which meant the elaborately rich baroque forms in the time of Louis XIV and the more delicate rococo elegance in that of Louis XV. The technique to which Boulle gave his name (sometimes referred to in its German spelling of Bühl) incorporated a rich variety of veneering materials into his designs: in particular, he used tortoiseshell and brass with ebony. Even greater richness was created with the introduction of an engraved design upon the brass surfaces. Further delicate elaboration derived from the use of paired panels of decoration to be used in reverse form in one piece, or two matching pieces, of furniture. In one panel, designated as première partie, the marquetry took the form of brass upon tortoiseshell, while in the other (contre-partie) the tortoiseshell was set into the brass background.

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SUBJECT AREA: Aerospace

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The Breguet family had been manufacturing fine clocks since before the French Revolution, but Louis Breguet and his brother Jacques used their mechanical skills to produce a helicopter, or "gyroplane" as they named it. It was a complex machine with four biplane rotors (i.e. thirty-two lifting surfaces). Louis Breguet had carried out many tests to determine the most suitable rotor design. The Breguet brothers were assisted by Professor Charles Richet and the Breguet-Richet No. 1 was tested in September 1907 when it succeeded in lifting itself, and its pilot, to a height of 1.5 metres. Unfortunately, the gyroplane was rather unstable and four helpers had to steady it; consequently, the flight did not qualify as a "free" flight. This was achieved two months later, also in France, by Paul Cornu who made a 20-second free flight.

Louis Breguet turned his attention to aeroplane design and produced a tractor biplane when most other biplanes followed the Wright brothers' layout with a forward elevator and pusher propeller. The Breguet I made quite an impression at the 1909 Reims meeting, but the Breguet IV created a world record the following year by carrying six people. During the First World War the Breguet Type 14 bomber was widely used by French and American squadrons. Between the First and Second World Wars a wide variety of designs were produced, including flying boats and another helicopter, the Breguet- Dorand Gyroplane which flew for over one hour in 1936. The Breguet company survived World War II and in the late 1940s developed a successful four-engined airliner/transport, the Deux-Ponts, which had a bulbous double-deck fuselage.

Breguet was an innovative designer, although his designs were functional rather than elegant. He was an early advocate of metal construction and developed an oleo- (oil-spring) undercarriage leg.

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SUBJECT AREA: Ports and shipping

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He was the son of a country lawyer who became legal advisor and travelling companion to certain rich Americans. At an early age Cousteau acquired a love of travel, of the sea and of cinematography: he made his first film at the age of 13. After an interrupted education he nevertheless passed the difficult entrance examination to the Ecole Navale in Brest, but his naval career was cut short in 1936 by injuries received in a serious motor accident. For his long recuperation he was drafted to Toulon. There he met Philippe Tailliez, a fellow naval officer, and Frédéric Dumas, a champion spearfisher, with whom he formed a long association and began to develop his underwater swimming and photography. He apparently took little part in the Second World War, but under cover he applied his photographic skills to espionage, for which he was awarded the Légion d'honneur after the war.

Cousteau sought greater freedom of movement underwater and, with Emile Gagnan, who worked in the laboratory of Air Liquide, he began experimenting to improve portable underwater breathing apparatus. As a result, in 1943 they invented the aqualung. Its simple design and robust construction provided a reliable and low-cost unit and revolutionized scientific and recreational diving. Gagnan shunned publicity, but Cousteau revelled in the new freedom to explore and photograph underwater and exploited the publicity potential to the full.

The Undersea Research Group was set up by the French Navy in 1944 and, based in Toulon, it provided Cousteau with the Opportunity to develop underwater exploration and filming techniques and equipment. Its first aims were minesweeping and exploration, but in 1948 Cousteau pioneered an extension to marine archaeology. In 1950 he raised the funds to acquire a surplus US-built minesweeper, which he fitted out to further his quest for exploration and adventure and named Calypso. Cousteau also sought and achieved public acclaim with the publication in 1953 of The Silent World, an account of his submarine observations, illustrated by his own brilliant photography. The book was an immediate success and was translated into twenty-two languages. In 1955 Calypso sailed through the Red Sea and the western Indian Ocean, and the outcome was a film bearing the same title as the book: it won an Oscar and the Palme d'Or at the Cannes film festival. This was his favoured medium for the expression of his ideas and observations, and a stream of films on the same theme kept his name before the public.

Cousteau's fame earned him appointment by Prince Rainier as Director of the Oceanographie Institute in Monaco in 1957, a post he held until 1988. With its museum and research centre, it offered Cousteau a useful base for his worldwide activities.

In the 1980s Cousteau turned again to technological development. Like others before him, he was concerned to reduce ships' fuel consumption by harnessing wind power. True to form, he raised grants from various sources to fund research and enlisted technical help, namely Lucien Malavard, Professor of Aerodynamics at the Sorbonne. Malavard designed a 44 ft (13.4 m) high non-rotating cylinder, which was fitted onto a catamaran hull, christened Moulin à vent. It was intended that its maiden Atlantic crossing in 1983 should herald a new age in ship propulsion, with large royalties to Cousteau. Unfortunately the vessel was damaged in a storm and limped to the USA under diesel power. A more robust vessel, the Alcyone, was fitted with two "Turbosails" in 1985 and proved successful, with a 40 per cent reduction in fuel consumption. However, oil prices fell, removing the incentive to fit the new device; the lucrative sales did not materialize and Alcyone remained the only vessel with Turbosails, sharing with Calypso Cousteau's voyages of adventure and exploration. In September 1995, Cousteau was among the critics of the decision by the French President Jacques Chirac to resume testing of nuclear explosive devices under the Mururoa atoll in the South Pacific.

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