Giauque, William Francis

Giauque, William Francis (jēōk`), 1895–1982, American chemist, b. Niagara Falls, Ont., Canada, grad. Univ. of California (B.S., 1920; Ph.D., 1922). A member of the faculty of the Univ. of California from 1922, he became professor in 1934. He was awarded the 1949 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his studies of the properties of substances at temperatures approaching absolute zero. In addition to discovering the adiabatic demagnetization method of producing temperatures below 1°K;, he was also the discoverer (with H. L. Johnston, 1929) of the second and third isotopes of oxygen.