Gabriel Lippmann was born in 1845 in Luxembourg. In 1875, he was awarded a doctorate in physics at the Sorbonne University, Paris, and became professor of mathematical physics. Lippmann also served as chairman of the experimental physics department. In 1912, Lippmann was elected President of the French Academy of Science.

Gabriel Lippmann was awarded the 1908 Nobel prize in physics, for the development of the technique of color photography, based upon the phenomenon of light interference.

Lippmann placed a sheet of glass coated with a light-sensitive emulsion In front of the object to be photographed. Then, he created with the aid of a mirror a collision between the light waves comming from the oposite directions. Thus, the interference of light was captured on the photographic sheet of glass, as intermittent light and dark bands. The distance between the bands was determined by the color of the light that produced them.

When one looks at such a photograph, the interference is recreated, but this time in the eye of the observer, who enjoys the colorful picture of the object.

Although it was color photography that gained Gabriel Lippmann world recognition, his other scientific achievements are no less important. He developed various instruments, engaged in seismography and astronomy, and even submitted an significant thesis on electron research.

Gabriel Lippmann passed away in 1921.