May 28

Marian Smoluchowski was a Polish physicist born in 1872 who made foundational contributions to the theory of Brownian motion and the kinetic theory of gases. His pioneering research on critical opalescence and fluctuations advanced understanding of phase transitions and statistical physics. He held professorships at Lviv University and the Jagiellonian University. An avid mountaineer, Smoluchowski climbed in the Tatra Mountains and documented his expeditions. His theoretical work influenced future developments in physical chemistry and thermodynamics. Despite his premature death in 1917, his scientific legacy endures in textbooks and ongoing research on stochastic processes. Smoluchowski is celebrated as one of the founders of modern statistical mechanics.

Paul Pelliot was a French sinologist and explorer born in 1878, renowned for his meticulous studies of Chinese history and language. He participated in the French Trans-Asian expedition to Turkestan from 1906 to 1908, where he acquired and documented thousands of ancient manuscripts. Pelliot's work at the Dunhuang caves unveiled critical Buddhist and historical texts, enriching Western understanding of Central Asian culture. He served as a lecturer at the Collège de France, sharing insights from his explorations and research. Pelliot's linguistic expertise and fieldwork methods set high standards in Oriental studies. His publications include detailed analyses of Silk Road civilizations and Chinese epigraphy. He died in 1945, leaving a legacy as one of the greatest 20th-century scholars of Sinology.