10 Facts About Henri Devaux

Henri Edgard Devaux was a French botanist, biophysicist, and plant physiologist who worked on gas exchange and membranes.

Henri Devaux then went to the University of Sorbonne and received a doctorate in 1889 for work under Gaston Bonnier on gas exchange in plant tissues.

Henri Devaux became the first chair of plant physiology at the University of Bordeaux in 1906 after spending time in the University of Dijon.

Henri Devaux was a popular demonstrator and experimenter, and his demonstrations on oil monolayer films on water with talc, camphor and toy boats were popular.

Henri Devaux made use of mercury and with this approach, using a known amount of liquid, he was able to compute the surface area of circular mono-layers of various fats, oils and proteins and estimate molecular weights.

Henri Devaux was brought up in a religious Protestant upbringing in a family that included many generations who worked as sailors and farmers.

Henri Devaux was disturbed by the death of his father in 1886 and began to examine the role of religion and his own science.

Henri Devaux rejected Claude Bernard's idea for the separation of religion and science.

Henri Devaux rejected ideas of evolution and believed in Biblical Creation.

In 1931, Henri Devaux shared the Laura Leonard Prize with Agnes Pockels for their respective investigations of the properties of surface layers and surface films.