Charles-Eugène Guye (; October 15, 1866 – July 15, 1942) was a Swiss physicist. He was born in Saint-Christophe (Champvent) and died in Geneva.
Life and works
Guye studied physics at the University of Geneva, where he received his doctorate in 1889, studying the phenomenon of optical rotatory dispersion.
From 1890 to 1892 Charles-Eugène worked as a Privatdozent (lecturer) in Geneva, and from 1894 to 1900 he was a Privatdozent at Zurich Polytechnic (now the Federal Institute of Technology Zurich ETH Zurich), switching his research interests to electrical engineering. Albert Einstein was one of his students. From 1900 to 1930 he was professor and director of the Physics Institute of the University of Geneva.
His research focus was in the fields of electric currents, magnetism, and electrical discharges in gases. Starting in 1907 and continuing for over a decade, he and his students Simon Ratnowsky and Charles Lavanchy conducted experiments that demonstrated the dependence of the electron mass on its speed, with results supporting the predictions of Lorentz, Einstein, and the special theory of relativity against Max Abraham's rival theory of the electron.
Guye was president both of the Swiss Physical Society, from 1914-1916, and of the Société de Physique et d'Histoire naturelle de Genève. Furthermore, he was editor-in-chief of Archives des Sciences physiques et naturelles and member of the editorial board of Helvetica Physica Acta.
He participated in the 5th and 7th Solvay Conferences, and was the author or co-author of over 200 papers in physics and several popular books, including philosophical works on the biological-physical-chemical basis of evolution and the limits of physics and biology.
In 2017 the European Physical Society declared the Bastions building of the Geneva University as an EPS Historic Site in honor of the scientific achievements made by Guye and Ernst Stueckelberg in this building.
His older brother, Philippe-Auguste (1862–1922), was a distinguished chemist.