Adolphe Carnot

Marie Adolphe Carnot (27 January 1839 – 20 June 1920) was a French chemist, mining engineer and politician.

He came from a distinguished family: his father, Hippolyte Carnot, and brother, Marie François Sadi Carnot, were politicians, the latter becoming President of the third French Republic.

His uncle, military engineer Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot, is considered the father of modern thermodynamics.

He became director of the École des Mines in 1901, a post he held until 1907.

Aside from administrative work and teaching and training many engineers, he wrote a treatise on the chemical analysis of minerals (Traité d'analyse des substances minérales, published 1898) and pursued research.