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Mersenne, Marin 1588-1648
French mathematician and scientist

Born in Oize, Maine, he became a Minim Friar in 1611, and lived in Paris. Devoting himself to science, he corresponded with all the leading scientists of his day including Descartes, Pierre de Fermat, Pascal and Thomas Hobbes, acting as a clearing house for scientific information. He experimented with the pendulum and found the law relating its length and period of oscillation, studied the acoustics of vibrating strings and organ pipes and measured the speed of sound. He also wrote on music, mathematics, optics and philosophy.