BAZIN, HENRI-MILE

born Jan. 10, 1829, Nancy, France died Feb. 7, 1917, Dijon engineer and member of the French Corps des Ponts et Chausses ("Corps of Bridges and Highways") whose contributions to hydraulics and fluid mechanics include the classic study of water flow in open channels. Bazin worked as an assistant to the noted hydraulic engineer H.-P.-G. Darcy (1803-58), whose program of tests on resistance to water flow in channels Bazin finished after Darcy died. The results were published in 1865. Bazin then carried his study over into the problem of wave propagation and the contraction of fluid flowing through an orifice. In 1854 he enlarged the Canal de Bourgogne and made it profitable for commercial navigation. In 1867 he suggested the use of pumps for dredging rivers, leading to the construction of the first suction dredgers. Bazin became chief engineer of the Corps des Ponts et Chausses in 1875 and was placed in charge of the Bourgogne canal system; he became inspector general in 1886. He retired in 1900 and was elected to the French Academy of Sciences in 1913.