Docket #:2014-04

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Is the achievement you are proposing more than 25 years old? Yes

Is the achievement you are proposing within IEEE’s fields of interest? (e.g. “the theory and practice of electrical, electronics, communications and computer engineering, as well as computer science, the allied branches of engineering and the related arts and sciences” – from the IEEE Constitution) Yes

Did the achievement provide a meaningful benefit for humanity? Yes

Was it of at least regional importance? Yes

Has an IEEE Organizational Unit agreed to pay for the milestone plaque(s)? Yes

Has an IEEE Organizational Unit agreed to arrange the dedication ceremony? Yes

Has the IEEE Section in which the milestone is located agreed to take responsibility for the plaque after it is dedicated? Yes

Has the owner of the site agreed to have it designated as an Electrical Engineering Milestone? Yes


Year or range of years in which the achievement occurred:

1917

Title of the proposed milestone:

Paul Langevin's Improvements to Sonar, 1917

Plaque citation summarizing the achievement and its significance:

In France in 1917, Paul Langevin, a French physicist, produced transceivers using the piezo-electric effect of quartz crystals, and designed a submarine detector based on the effect, resulting in an improved method for submarine ultrasonic echo detection, namely sonar, obtaining 4000 meter echo soundings from the cable ship CHARENTE in the Bay of Biscay. Echo sounding based on piezoelectric effect became a central topic for new researchers, academic physicists and electrical engineers, with many applications like medical echography and diverse acoustic sensors. Langevin’s extensive knowledge of and practice with piezoelectricity beneficiating from research of Pierre Curie, which allowed him to manipulate the crystals and contrive the novel ultrasonic design required

In what IEEE section(s) does it reside?

France

IEEE Organizational Unit(s) which have agreed to sponsor the Milestone:

IEEE Organizational Unit(s) paying for milestone plaque(s):

Unit: IEEE France
Senior Officer Name: Senior officer name masked to public

IEEE Organizational Unit(s) arranging the dedication ceremony:

Unit: IEEE France
Senior Officer Name: Senior officer name masked to public

IEEE section(s) monitoring the plaque(s):

IEEE Section: France
IEEE Section Chair name: Section chair name masked to public

Milestone proposer(s):

Proposer name: Proposer's name masked to public
Proposer email: Proposer's email masked to public

Please note: your email address and contact information will be masked on the website for privacy reasons. Only IEEE History Center Staff will be able to view the email address.

Street address(es) and GPS coordinates of the intended milestone plaque site(s):

THe Langevin Institute 1 rue Jussieu, 75238 Paris Cedex 05, France http://www.institut-langevin.espci.fr/the_langevin_institute?lang=en

Describe briefly the intended site(s) of the milestone plaque(s). The intended site(s) must have a direct connection with the achievement (e.g. where developed, invented, tested, demonstrated, installed, or operated, etc.). A museum where a device or example of the technology is displayed, or the university where the inventor studied, are not, in themselves, sufficient connection for a milestone plaque.

Please give the address(es) of the plaque site(s) (GPS coordinates if you have them). Also please give the details of the mounting, i.e. on the outside of the building, in the ground floor entrance hall, on a plinth on the grounds, etc. If visitors to the plaque site will need to go through security, or make an appointment, please give the contact information visitors will need.

Historic site. Paul Langevin was Professor at ESPCI that host the Langevin Institute. Sonar has been invented in ESPCI (Ecole Superieure de Physique Chimie) in Paris (http://www.espci.fr/en/)

Are the original buildings extant?

New extant hosting "The Langevin Institute". The Langevin Institute is an extend of ESPCI

Details of the plaque mounting:

Entrance Hall of the Langevin Institute.

How is the site protected/secured, and in what ways is it accessible to the public?

All visitors have access to Entrance Hall of the Langevin Institute

Who is the present owner of the site(s)?

ESPCI (http://www.espci.fr/en/)

A letter in English, or with English translation, from the site owner(s) giving permission to place IEEE milestone plaque on the property:

File:IEEE-Sensors-Langevin.doc

A letter or email from the appropriate Section Chair supporting the Milestone application:

File:IEEE-Sensors-Langevin.pdf

What is the historical significance of the work (its technological, scientific, or social importance)?

See attached document. Many applications in civil (echography, ...) and military domains (sonar)

What obstacles (technical, political, geographic) needed to be overcome?

Technical issue: control of piezo-electric Quartz transducer

What features set this work apart from similar achievements?

Radar invention

References to establish the dates, location, and importance of the achievement: Minimum of five (5), but as many as needed to support the milestone, such as patents, contemporary newspaper articles, journal articles, or citations to pages in scholarly books. At least one of the references must be from a scholarly book or journal article.

Langevin Patents : [P1] Chilowsky CM, Langevin MP. Procédés et appareils pour la production de signaux sous-marins dirigés et pour la localisation à distance d’obstacles sous-marins. French patent #502913, 1916 [P2] Chilowsky CM, Langevin MP. Production of submarine signals and the location of submarine objects. US Patent #1471547, 1917 [P3] Langevin MP. 1918 ‘Procédé et appareils d’émission et de réception des ondes élastiques sous-marines à l’aide des propriétés piézo-électriques du quartz’ (Brevet francais, No. 505703, 17 Septembre 1918) pp. 538–542 in: Oeuvres Scientifiques de Paul Langevin, CNRS, Paris,1950 References: [1] Shaul Katzir, Who knew piezoelectricity? Rutherford and Langevin on submarine detection and the invention of sonar, Notes and Records, The Royal Society Journal of The History of Science, March 7, 2012 [2] David Zimmerman, Paul Langevin and the Discovery of Active Sonar or Asdic, The Northern Mariner/Le marin du nord, XII, No. 1, pp. 39-52, January 2002 [3] Benoit Lelong, Paul Langevin et la détection sous-marine, 1914-1929: Un Physicien acteur de l’Innovation industrielle et militaire, Epistémologiques, Vol.2, n°1-2, p. 205-232, Juin 2002 [4] Manbachi, A.; Cobbold, R. S. C., Development and application of piezoelectric materials for ultrasound generation and detection. Ultrasound 19 (4): 187., 2011

Supporting materials (supported formats: GIF, JPEG, PNG, PDF, DOC): All supporting materials must be in English, or if not in English, accompanied by an English translation. You must supply the texts or excerpts themselves, not just the references. For documents that are copyright-encumbered, or which you do not have rights to post, email the documents themselves to ieee-history@ieee.org. Please see the Milestone Program Guidelines for more information.