Léon Guillet

Léon Alexandre Guillet (11 July 1873 – 9 May 1946) was a French metallurgist who studied the properties of metal alloys and developed martensitic and austenitic stainless steels.

He served as a professor of metallurgy at the École Centrale Paris where he was a director from 1923 and played a key role in putting materials research on a scientific footing.

Guillet was born in Saint Nazaire (Loire Atlantique) and in 1894 he went to the school of art and manufacture where he met Henri Le Chatelier who guided him.

His doctoral thesis was on aluminium alloys and the work was done at Dion-Bouton and at Le Chatelier's laboratory in the Ecole des Mines.

Guillet published his major metallurgical works including Traité de métallurgie génerale (1922), Les méthodes d'étude des alliages métalliques (1923), and Trempe, recuit, revenue (2 volumes, 1928–1931).