This is a list of notable French

scientist A scientist is a person who conducts Scientific method, scientific research to advance knowledge in an Branches of science, area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, ...

A–F

* José Achache, geophysicist and ecologist *

Jean le Rond d'Alembert Jean-Baptiste le Rond d'Alembert (; ; 16 November 1717 – 29 October 1783) was a French mathematician, mechanician, physicist, philosopher, and music theorist. Until 1759 he was, together with Denis Diderot, a co-editor of the ''Encyclopédie ...

, mathematician, mechanician, physicist and philosopher *

Claude Allègre Claude Allègre (; born 31 March 1937) is a French politician and scientist. Scientific work The main scientific area of Claude Allègre was geochemistry. Allègre co-authored an ''Introduction to geochemistry'' in 1974. Since the 1980s, he m ...

, geochemist *

André-Marie Ampère André-Marie Ampère (, ; ; 20 January 177510 June 1836) was a French physicist and mathematician who was one of the founders of the science of classical electromagnetism, which he referred to as "electrodynamics". He is also the inventor of nu ...

, physicist and mathematician *

Françoise Ardré Françoise Ardré (1931–2010) was a French phycologist and marine scientist, honoured as the namesake of the red alga known as ''Pterosiphonia ardreana''. Christine A. Maggs & Max H. Hommersand (1993) ''Seaweeds of the British Isles: a collabo ...

, phycologist, marine scientist *

Louis Bachelier Louis Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Bachelier (; 11 March 1870 – 28 April 1946) was a French mathematician at the turn of the 20th century. He is credited with being the first person to model the stochastic process now called Brownian motion, as part ...

, mathematician *

Antoine Jérôme Balard Antoine Jérôme Balard (30 September 1802 – 30 April 1876) was a French chemist and one of the discoverers of bromine. Career Born at Montpellier, France, on 30 September 1802, he started as an apothecary, but taking up teaching he acted a ...

, chemist *

Éliane Basse Éliane Basse or Éliane Basse de Ménorval (21 May 1899 – 28 January 1985) was a French paleontologist and geologist who became research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research in 1960. Life A student at the École n ...

, paleontologist and geologist * Pierre-Dominique Bazaine, mathematician and engineer * Jean de Beaurain, geographer *

Antoine César Becquerel Antoine César Becquerel (7 March 178818 January 1878) was a French scientist and a pioneer in the study of electric and luminescent phenomena. Life He was born at Châtillon-sur-Loing (today Châtillon-Coligny). After passing through the École p ...

, electrochemist * A.E. Becquerel, physicist *

Henri Becquerel Antoine Henri Becquerel (; 15 December 1852 – 25 August 1908) was a French engineer, physicist, Nobel laureate, and the first person to discover evidence of radioactivity. For work in this field he, along with Marie Skłodowska-Curie and P ...

, physicist and Nobel laureate *

Jean Becquerel Jean Antoine Edmond Marie Becquerel (5 February 1878 – 4 July 1953) was a French physicist, the son of Antoine-Henri Becquerel. He worked on a range of experimental physics topics including magnetic effects on the optical properties of materials ...

, physicist * Léon Bence, physician *

Jacques Benoit (biologist) Jacques Marie Benoit (February 26, 1896 - December 1, 1982) was a French physician, biologist and neuroendocrinologist. He was a professor at the Collège de France and is considered one of the pioneers of neuroendocrinology and photobiology. ...

, physician, biologist and neuroendocrinologist *

Claude Bernard Claude Bernard (; 12 July 1813 – 10 February 1878) was a French physiologist. Historian I. Bernard Cohen of Harvard University called Bernard "one of the greatest of all men of science". He originated the term ''milieu intérieur'', and the a ...

, physiologist *

Marcellin Berthelot Pierre Eugène Marcellin Berthelot (; 25 October 1827 – 18 March 1907) was a French chemist and Republican politician noted for the ThomsenBerthelot principle of thermochemistry. He synthesized many organic compounds from inorganic substance ...

, chemist *

Julien Bessières Henri Géraud Julien, Chevalier Bessières et de l'Empire (30 July 1777, Gramat, Lot – 30 July 1840, Paris) was a French scientist and diplomat. He was a cousin of marshal Jean-Baptiste Bessières and Bertrand Bessières. Life He was a member ...

, physician, diplomat, and member of the

Commission des Sciences et des Arts The Commission des Sciences et des Arts (''Commission of the Sciences and Arts'') was a French scientific and artistic institute. Established on 16 March 1798, it consisted of 167 members, of which all but 16 joined Napoleon Bonaparte's conquest ...

Jean Bosler Jean Bosler (24 March 1878, Angers – 25 September 1973, Marseille) was a French astronomer and author of several books. Recruited by Deslandres as an astronomer at l’observatoire de Paris, Bosler discovered in 1908 in the spectrum of Comet M ...

, astronomer *

Claude Bourgelat Claude Bourgelat (27 March 1712 – 3 January 1779) was a French veterinary surgeon. He was a founder of scientifically informed veterinary medicine, and he created one of the earliest schools for training professional veterinarians. Life a ...

, veterinary surgeon *

Thomas Bourgeron Thomas Bourgeron is a French scientist working at the Institut Pasteur. The group he leads has discovered the first monogenic mutations involved in autism. He is member of the French Academy of sciences The French Academy of Sciences (French: ...

, neuroscientist *

Jean-Baptiste Boussingault Jean-Baptiste Joseph Dieudonné Boussingault (2 February 1801 – 11 May 1887) was a French chemist who made significant contributions to agricultural science, petroleum science and metallurgy. Biography Jean-Baptiste Boussingault – an agric ...

, chemist *

Gerard Brachet Gerard is a masculine forename of Proto-Germanic origin, variations of which exist in many Germanic and Romance languages. Like many other early Germanic names, it is dithematic, consisting of two meaningful constituents put together. In this ca ...

, space scientist *

Paul Broca Pierre Paul Broca (, also , , ; 28 June 1824 – 9 July 1880) was a French physician, anatomist and anthropologist. He is best known for his research on Broca's area, a region of the frontal lobe that is named after him. Broca's area is involve ...

, physician, surgeon, anatomist, and anthropologist * Bernard Brunhes, physicist *

Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (; 7 September 1707 – 16 April 1788) was a French naturalist, mathematician, cosmologist, and encyclopédiste. His works influenced the next two generations of naturalists, including two prominent Fr ...

, naturalist and mathematician *

Bernard Cabane Bernard Cabane (born 12 October 1945) is a French mountaineer, scientist (physicist and chemist), director emeritus of the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in ESPCI ParisTech where he worked with Nobel Laureate Pierre Gilles ...

, physicist *

Pierre Jean George Cabanis Pierre Jean Georges Cabanis (; 5 June 1757 – 5 May 1808) was a French physiologist, freemason and materialist philosopher. Life Cabanis was born at Cosnac (Corrèze), the son of Jean Baptiste Cabanis (1723–1786), a lawyer and agronomist. ...

, physiologist *

Albert Calmette Léon Charles Albert Calmette ForMemRS (12 July 1863 – 29 October 1933) was a French physician, bacteriologist and immunologist, and an important officer of the Pasteur Institute. He discovered the Bacillus Calmette-Guérin, an attenuated for ...

, physician, bacteriologist and immunologist *

Georges Canguilhem Georges Canguilhem (; ; 4 June 1904 – 11 September 1995) was a French philosopher and physician who specialized in epistemology and the philosophy of science (in particular, biology). Life and work Canguilhem entered the École Normale Supé ...

, physician and philosopher *

Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot ''Sous-lieutenant'' Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot (; 1 June 1796 – 24 August 1832) was a French mechanical engineer in the French Army, military scientist and physicist, and often described as the "father of thermodynamics". He published onl ...

, physicist and military engineer *

Henri Cartan Henri Paul Cartan (; 8 July 1904 – 13 August 2008) was a French mathematician who made substantial contributions to algebraic topology. He was the son of the mathematician Élie Cartan, nephew of mathematician Anna Cartan, oldest brother of co ...

, mathematician *

Augustin-Louis Cauchy Baron Augustin-Louis Cauchy (, ; ; 21 August 178923 May 1857) was a French mathematician, engineer, and physicist who made pioneering contributions to several branches of mathematics, including mathematical analysis and continuum mechanics. He ...

, mathematician and physicist *

Jean-François Champollion Jean-François Champollion (), also known as Champollion ''le jeune'' ('the Younger'; 23 December 17904 March 1832), was a French philologist and orientalist, known primarily as the decipherer of Egyptian hieroglyphs and a founding figure in th ...

, philologist *

Georges Charpak Georges Charpak (; born Jerzy Charpak, 1 August 1924 – 29 September 2010) was a Polish-born French physicist, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1992. Life Georges Charpak was born Jerzy Charpak to Jewish parents, Anna (Szapiro) and ...

, physicist, Nobel prize winner 1992 * Georges Charpy, physicist and metallurgist *

Albert Châtelet Albert Châtelet (24 October 1883 – 30 June 1960) was a French politician and mathematician. Biography Châtelet was a student at the École normale supérieure (Paris) from 1905 to 1908, succeeding to the Agrégation (a highly selective compe ...

, mathematician *

Émilie du Châtelet Gabrielle Émilie Le Tonnelier de Breteuil, Marquise du Châtelet (; 17 December 1706 – 10 September 1749) was a French natural philosopher and mathematician from the early 1730s until her death due to complications during childbirth in 1749. ...

, mathematician and physicist * Jean Mathieu de Chazelles, professor of hydrography *

Michel Che Michel Che (29 December 1941 – 7 August 2019) was a French chemist who completed his doctorate (Electron paramagnetic resonance, EPR study of titanium dioxide) in 1968 at the University of Lyon and studied as a postdoctoral fellow at Princeton Un ...

, chemist *

Gustave Choquet Gustave Choquet (; 1 March 1915 – 14 November 2006) was a French mathematician. Choquet was born in Solesmes, Nord. His contributions include work in functional analysis, potential theory, topology and measure theory. He is known for creati ...

, mathematician *

Charles Pierre Claret de Fleurieu Charles Pierre Claret, comte de Fleurieu (2 July 1738, Lyon – 18 August 1810) was a French Navy officer, explorer, hydrographer and politician. He served as Minister of the Navy under Louis XVI, and was a member of the Institut de France. He was ...

, explorer, hydrographer and politician *

Alain Connes Alain Connes (; born 1 April 1947) is a French mathematician, and a theoretical physicist, known for his contributions to the study of operator algebras and noncommutative geometry. He is a professor at the , , Ohio State University and Vande ...

, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1982 *

Louis Couffignal Louis Pierre Couffignal (16 March 1902 – 4 July 1966) was a French mathematician and cybernetics pioneer, born in Monflanquin. He taught in schools in the southwest of Brittany, then at the naval academy and, eventually, at the Buffon School. ...

, mathematician and cybernetician *

Charles-Augustin de Coulomb Charles-Augustin de Coulomb (; ; 14 June 1736 – 23 August 1806) was a French officer, engineer, and physicist. He is best known as the eponymous discoverer of what is now called Coulomb's law, the description of the electrostatic force of attrac ...

, physicist * Jean Courtial, physician and polytechnician *

Vincent Courtillot Vincent E. Courtillot (born 6 March 1948) is an emeritus French geophysicist, prominent among the researchers who are critical of the hypothesis that impact events are a primary cause of mass extinction of life forms on the Earth. He is known for ...

, geophysicist *

Philippe Cousteau Philippe Pierre Cousteau (30 December 1940 – 28 June 1979) was a French diver, sailor, pilot, photographer, author, director and cinematographer specializing in environmental issues, with a background in oceanography. He was the second son of ...

, oceanographer *

Jean-Marie-Joseph Coutelle Jean-Marie-Joseph Coutelle (3 January 1748, in Le Mans – 20 March 1835, in Paris) was a French engineer, scientist and pioneer of ballooning. Life He got to know the physicist Alexandre Charles and, in the wake of the experiences of the Montg ...

, engineer, scientist and pioneer of ballooning *

Adam de Craponne Adam de Craponne (; 1526–1576) was a French engineer. He built the eponymous Canal de Craponne to irrigate the ''Désert de la Crau''. He was poisoned while fortifying Nantes for King Henry III of France during the French Wars of Religion Earl ...

, engineer who implemented the

Canal de Craponne The Canal de Craponne, Craponne canal, is a canal in the Pélissanne commune of the Bouches-du-Rhône department of France. It was originally conceived and built between 1554 and 1559 by the engineer Adam de Craponne to bring fresh water 25km from ...

in 1559 *

Jean Cruveilhier Jean Cruveilhier (; 9 February 1791 – 7 March 1874) was a French anatomist and pathologist. Academic career Cruveilhier was born in Limoges, France. As a student in Limoges, he planned to enter the priesthood. He later developed an inte ...

, anatomist and pathologist *

Marie Curie Marie Salomea Skłodowska–Curie ( , , ; born Maria Salomea Skłodowska, ; 7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934) was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first ...

, physicist and chemist, two Nobel Prizes, in physics (1903) and chemistry (1911) *

Pierre Curie Pierre Curie ( , ; 15 May 1859 – 19 April 1906) was a French physicist, a pioneer in crystallography, magnetism, piezoelectricity, and radioactivity. In 1903, he received the Nobel Prize in Physics with his wife, Marie Curie, and Henri Becqu ...

, physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize in physics (1903) *

Georges Cuvier Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric, Baron Cuvier (; 23 August 1769 – 13 May 1832), known as Georges Cuvier, was a French natural history, naturalist and zoology, zoologist, sometimes referred to as the "founding father of paleontology". Cuvier ...

, regarded as the founding father of palaeontology *

Boris Cyrulnik Boris Cyrulnik (birth 26 July 1937 in Bordeaux) is a French doctor, ethologist, neurologist, and psychiatrist. As a Jewish child during World War II, he was entrusted to a foster family for his own protection. In 1943 he was taken with adults in ...

, ethologist, neurologist, and psychiatrist *

Thomas-François Dalibard Thomas-François Dalibard (born in Crannes-en-Champagne, France in 1709, died in 1778) was a French physicist who performed the first lightning rod experiment. He was married to the novelist and playwright Françoise-Thérèse Aumerle de Saint-P ...

, physicist and botanist *

Henry Darcy Henry Philibert Gaspard Darcy (, 10 June 1803 – 3 January 1858) was a French engineer who made several important contributions to hydraulics, including Darcy’s law for flow in porous media. Early life Darcy was born in Dijon, France, on J ...

, hydraulic engineer * Michel Darluc, naturalist *

Raymond Daudel Raymond Daudel (2 February 1920Obituary by Jean Maruani
– 20 June 2006) was a F ...

, quantum chemist *

Jean Dausset Jean-Baptiste-Gabriel-Joachim Dausset (19 October 1916 – 6 June 2009) was a French immunologist born in Toulouse, France. Dausset received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1980 along with Baruj Benacerraf and George Davis Snell fo ...

, biologist, Nobel prize winner 1980 *

André-Louis Debierne André-Louis Debierne (; 14 July 1874 – 31 August 1949) was a French chemist. He is often considered the discoverer of the element actinium, though H. W. Kirby disputes this and awards credit instead to German chemist Friedrich Oskar Giesel. De ...

, chemist *

Jean Baptiste Joseph Delambre Jean Baptiste Joseph, chevalier Delambre (19 September 1749 – 19 August 1822) was a French mathematician, astronomer, historian of astronomy, and geodesist. He was also director of the Paris Observatory, and author of well-known books on t ...

, mathematician and astronomer *

Marcel Deprez Marcel Deprez (12 December 1843 – 13 October 1918) was a French electrical engineer. He was born in Aillant-sur-Milleron. He died in Vincennes. Biography Deprez was born in Aillant-sur-Milleron in rural France and attended the School of Mines in ...

, electrical engineer *

John Theophilus Desaguliers John Theophilus Desaguliers FRS (12 March 1683 – 29 February 1744) was a British natural philosopher, clergyman, engineer and freemason who was elected to the Royal Society in 1714 as experimental assistant to Isaac Newton. He had studied at O ...

, natural philosopher (physicist) *

Guillaume Delisle Guillaume Delisle, also spelled Guillaume de l'Isle, (; 28 February 1675, Paris – 25 January 1726, Paris) was a French cartographer known for his popular and accurate maps of Europe and the newly explored Americas. Childhood and education Desli ...

, cartographer *

Girard Desargues Girard Desargues (; 21 February 1591 – September 1661) was a French mathematician and engineer, who is considered one of the founders of projective geometry. Desargues' theorem, the Desargues graph, and the crater Desargues on the Moon are ...

, mathematician *

René Descartes René Descartes ( or ; ; Latinized: Renatus Cartesius; 31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, widely considered a seminal figure in the emergence of modern philosophy and science. Mathem ...

, scientist and philosopher *

Robert Debré Robert Debré (7 December 1882 – 29 April 1978) was a French physician (pediatrician) at Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital in Paris. The largest pediatric hospital in Paris, l'Hôpital Robert-Debré - located in the North-East part of Paris (19 ...

, physician *

Georges Duby Georges Duby (7 October 1919 – 3 December 1996) was a French historian who specialised in the social and economic history of the Middle Ages. He ranks among the most influential medieval historians of the twentieth century and was one of Franc ...

, historian *

Jean-Baptiste du Hamel Jean-Baptiste Du Hamel, Duhamel or du Hamel (11 June 1624 – 6 August 1706) was a French cleric and natural philosopher of the late seventeenth century, and the first secretary of the Academie Royale des Sciences. As its first secretary, he in ...

, natural philosopher (physicist) * Émilien Dumas, paleontologist, and geologist *

Jean-Baptiste Dumas Jean Baptiste André Dumas (14 July 180010 April 1884) was a French chemist, best known for his works on organic analysis and synthesis, as well as the determination of atomic weights (relative atomic masses) and molecular weights by measuring v ...

, chemist * Charles François Dupuis, polymath and theologian *

Pierre Fauchard Pierre Fauchard (January 2, 1679 – March 21, 1761) was a French physician, credited as being the "father of modern dentistry". He is widely known for writing the first complete scientific description of dentistry, ''Le Chirurgien Dentiste'' (''" ...

, dentist *

Hervé Faye Hervé Auguste Étienne Albans Faye ( – ) was a French astronomer, born at Saint-Benoît-du-Sault (Indre) and educated at the École Polytechnique, which he left in 1834, before completing his course, to accept a position in the Paris Obse ...

, astronomer *

Pierre de Fermat Pierre de Fermat (; between 31 October and 6 December 1607 – 12 January 1665) was a French mathematician who is given credit for early developments that led to infinitesimal calculus, including his technique of adequality. In particular, he ...

, mathematician *

Louis Feuillée Louis Éconches Feuillée (sometimes spelled Feuillet) (1660, Mane, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence – 18 April 1732) was a French member of the Order of the Minims, explorer, astronomer, geographer, and botanist. Biography Feuillée was educated at th ...

, explorer, astronomer, geographer, and botanist *

Bernard Foing Bernard Foing is a French scientist at the European Space Agency (ESA), Executive Director of thInternational Lunar Exploration Working Group(ILEWG) and was Principal Project Scientist for SMART-1, the first European mission to the Moon. He is a ...

, astronomer *

Pierre Fourmanoir Pierre Fourmanoir (1924–2007) was a French ichthyologist working mainly in New Caledonia ) , anthem = "" , image_map = New Caledonia on the globe (small islands magnified) (Polynesia centered).svg , map_alt = Location of New Caledonia , ma ...

, ichthyologist *

Joseph Fourier Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier (; ; 21 March 1768 – 16 May 1830) was a French people, French mathematician and physicist born in Auxerre and best known for initiating the investigation of Fourier series, which eventually developed into Fourier an ...

, mathematician and physicist *

Augustin-Jean Fresnel Augustin-Jean Fresnel (10 May 1788 – 14 July 1827) was a French civil engineer and physicist whose research in optics led to the almost unanimous acceptance of the wave theory of light, excluding any remnant of Isaac Newton, Newton's co ...

, physicist known for work on optics

G–M

Pierre-Gilles de Gennes Pierre-Gilles de Gennes (; 24 October 1932 – 18 May 2007) was a French physicist and the Nobel Prize laureate in physics in 1991. Education and early life He was born in Paris, France, and was home-schooled to the age of 12. By the age of ...

, mathematician and physicist *

Paul Gervais Paul Gervais full name François Louis Paul Gervais (26 September 1816 – 10 February 1879) was a French palaeontologist and entomologist. Biography Gervais was born in Paris, where he obtained the diplomas of doctor of science and of medicine ...

, palaeontologist and entomologist *

Jacques Géry Jacques Géry (12 March 1917, Paris – 15 June 2007, Sarlat, France) was a French ichthyologist. He was also a scientist and a Doctor of Medicine. The most notable species he described are: * Green neon tetra, ''Paracheirodon simulans'' (Géry, ...

, ichthyologist *

Mirko Grmek Mirko Dražen Grmek (9 January 1924 – 6 March 2000) was a Croatian and French historian of medicine, writer and scientist. He was one of the pioneers and founders of the history of medicine. His entire opus promotes the historical research of me ...

, historian of medicine *

Camille Guérin Jean-Marie Camille Guérin (; 22 December 1872 – 9 June 1961) was a French veterinarian, bacteriologist and immunologist who, together with Albert Calmette, developed the Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG), a vaccine for immunization against tube ...

, biologist * Alexander Grothendieck, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1966 (German-born) *

André Guinier André Guinier (1 August 1911 – 3 July 2000) was a French physicist who did important work in the field of X-ray diffraction and solid-state physics. He worked at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, then taught at the University o ...

, physicist *

Jacques Hadamard Jacques Salomon Hadamard (; 8 December 1865 – 17 October 1963) was a French mathematician who made major contributions in number theory, complex analysis, differential geometry and partial differential equations. Biography The son of a teac ...

, mathematician * Armand Havet, botanist *

Charles Hermite Charles Hermite () FRS FRSE MIAS (24 December 1822 – 14 January 1901) was a French mathematician who did research concerning number theory, quadratic forms, invariant theory, orthogonal polynomials, elliptic functions, and algebra. Hermi ...

, mathematician *

François Jacob François Jacob (17 June 1920 – 19 April 2013) was a French biologist who, together with Jacques Monod, originated the idea that control of enzyme levels in all cells occurs through regulation of transcription. He shared the 1965 Nobel Prize i ...

, biologist, Nobel prize winner 1965 *

Charles Janet Charles Janet (; 15 June 1849 – 7 February 1932) was a French engineer, company director, inventor and biologist. He is also known for his innovative ''left-step'' presentation of the periodic table of chemical elements. Life and work Janet gr ...

, chemist and biologist *

Paul Janet Paul Alexandre René Janet (30 April 1823 – 4 October 1899) was a French philosopher and writer. Biography Born in Paris, he became professor of moral philosophy at Bourges (1845–1848) and Strasbourg (1848–1857), and of logic at the ''lyc ...

, philosopher *

Irène Joliot-Curie Irène Joliot-Curie (; ; 12 September 1897 – 17 March 1956) was a French chemist, physicist and politician, the elder daughter of Pierre and Marie Curie, and the wife of Frédéric Joliot-Curie. Jointly with her husband, Joliot-Curie was award ...

, physicist and Nobel Prize winner *

Frédéric Joliot-Curie Jean Frédéric Joliot-Curie (; ; 19 March 1900 – 14 August 1958) was a French physicist and husband of Irène Joliot-Curie, with whom he was jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1935 for their discovery of Induced radioactivity. T ...

, physicist, Nobel Prize winner 1935 *

Jean Jouzel Jean Jouzel, (born 5 March 1947) is a prominent France, French glaciologist and climatologist. He has mainly worked on the reconstruction of past climate derived from the study of the Antarctic and Greenland ice. Career Jean Jouzel's career occu ...

, glaciologist and climatologist *

Gaston Julia Gaston Maurice Julia (3 February 1893 – 19 March 1978) was a French Algerian mathematician who devised the formula for the Julia set. His works were popularized by French mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot; the Julia and Mandelbrot fractals are cl ...

, mathematician * Étienne Hubert d'Orléans, Arabist *

Nicole El Karoui Nicole El Karoui (''née'' Schvartz) is a French mathematician and pioneer in the development of mathematical finance, born May 29, 1944, in Paris. She is considered one of the pioneers on the French school of mathematical finance and trained ma ...

, mathematician *

Robert Kühner Robert Kühner (15 March 1903 in Paris – 27 February 1996 in Lyon) was a French mycologist most notable for reviewing many forms of agaric (mushroom fungus) genera. He studied at the Sorbonne, afterwards from 1921 until 1932, he was working ...

, mycologist * Michel de La Vigne, physician *

Yves Lacoste Yves Lacoste (born 7 September 1929) is a French geographer and geopolitician. He was born in Fes, Morocco. Life In 1976 he established the French geopolitical journal ''Hérodote'' and published a work that shook the French academy, ''La Gé ...

, geographer and geopolitician *

Laurent Lafforgue Laurent Lafforgue (; born 6 November 1966) is a French mathematician. He has made outstanding contributions to Langlands' program in the fields of number theory and analysis, and in particular proved the Langlands conjectures for the automorphism ...

, mathematician; Fields Medalist 2002 *

Frédéric de Lafresnaye Baron Nöel Frédéric Armand André de Lafresnaye (24 July 1783 – 14 July 1861) was a French ornithologist and collector. Lafresnaye was born into an aristocratic family at Chateau de La Fresnaye in Falaise, Calvados, Falaise, Normandy. He ...

, ornithologist * Joseph Louis Lagrange, mathematician * Jean Laherrère, consultant and petroleum engineer * Claude François Lallemand, physician and pathologist * Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, evolutionary biologist * Paul Langevin, physicist * Pierre-Simon Laplace, mathematician and physicist * François-de-Paule Latapie, botanist * Lucien Laubier, oceanographer * René Lavocat, paleontologist * Antoine Lavoisier, chemist * Xavier Le Pichon, geophysicist * Jean-Marie Lehn, chemist, Nobel prize winner in 1987 * Jean-Marc Lévy-Leblond, physicist * Claude Lévi-Strauss, anthropologist * Arnoult de Lisle, Arabist and physician * Pierre-Louis Lions, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1994 * Edmond Locard, pioneer of forensic science * André Lwoff, biologist, Nobel prize winner 1965 * Jean-Michel Macron, neurologist * Charles Madic, radiochemist * Jean-Jacques d'Ortous de Mairan, geophysicist, astronomer and chronobiologist * Benoit Mandelbrot, mathematician * Jacques Masquelier, phytochemistry, phytochemist * Albert Mathiez, historian * Pierre Louis Maupertuis, mathematician and philosopher * Prosper Ménière, doctor concerned with hearing loss and tinnitus * Marin Mersenne, mathematician * André Michaux, botanist and explorer * François André Michaux, botanist * Jean-Louis Michel (oceanographer), Jean-Louis Michel, oceanographer and engineer * Jules Michelet, historian * Alphonse Milne-Edwards, mammalologist and ornithologist * Abraham de Moivre, mathematician * Jacques Monod, biologist, Nobel prize winner 1965 * Théodore Monod, naturalist and theologian * Gabriel Mouton, mathematician and astronomer

N–Z

* Adolphe-Simon Neboux, surgeon and naturalist * Louis Néel, physicist, Nobel Prize winner 1970 * André Niederlender, archaeologist * Jean de Noailles, chemist * Jean-Baptiste Noulet, archaeologist * Hélène Olivier-Bourbigou, chemist and researcher * Henri Padé, mathematician * Paul Painlevé, mathematician * Denis Papin, physicist, mathematician, and inventor * Blaise Pascal, mathematician and philosopher * Étienne Pascal, mathematician * Louis Pasteur, microbiologist and chemist * Jean Pecquet, psychologist * Jean-Marie Pelt, botanist * Jean-Pierre Petit, engineer * Jean Robert Petit, paleoclimatology, paleoclimatologist * Alphonse Pinart, philologist * Gilles Pisier, mathematician * Hippolyte Pixii, inventor * Henri Poincaré, mathematician and physicist * Lucien Poincaré, physicist * Siméon Poisson, mathematician and physicist * Pierre Poivre, horticulturist and botanist * Albéric Pont, dentist and pioneer in maxillofacial surgery * Alberte Pullman, quantum chemist * Bernard Pullman, quantum chemist * Lucien Quélet, naturalist and mycologist * Petrus Ramus, mathematician and logician * Louis-Antoine Ranvier, physician, pathologist, anatomist and histologist * Didier Raoult, microbiologist and virologist * René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur, entomologist * Jean-Baptiste Robinet, naturalist * Paul Rohmer, physician * Michel Rolle, mathematician * Henri Romagnesi, mycologist * Joël de Rosnay, scientific administrator * Jean Rostand, biologist and philosopher * Louis Rougier, mathematician, physicist, and philosopher * Nicolas Sarrabat, mathematician concerned with many aspects of science * Henri Émile Sauvage, ichthyologist, paleontologist, and herpetologist * Schlumberger brothers (Conrad Schlumberger and Marcel Schlumberger) * Laurent Schwartz, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1950 * Géraud Sénizergues, computer scientist and 2002 Gödel Prize recipient. * Jean-Pierre Serre, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1954 * Michel Talagrand, mathematician * Jules Tannery, mathematician * Auguste Ambroise Tardieu, forensic medical scientist * Daniel Tauvry, physician * Fabiola Terzi, physician-scientist * Melchisédech Thévenot, inventor of the spirit level * Adrien-Jean-Pierre Thilorier, discovered dry ice * René Thom, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1958 * Muriel Thomasset physicist * Pierre-Marie-Jérôme Trésaguet, engineer and road builder * François Trèves, mathematician * Georges Valiron, mathematician * Jean-Pierre Vernant, historian * Jean-Christophe Victor, geographer * Paul-Émile Victor, ethnologist * François Viète, mathematician * Louis Jean Pierre Vieillot, ornithologist * Charles Athanase Walckenaer, geographer * Wendelin Werner, mathematician; Fields Medalist 2006 (German-born) * Rachid Yazami, engineer and inventor * Jean-Christophe Yoccoz, mathematician; Fields Medalist 1994

A–F

G–M

N–Z

See also