Jean Morlet - Geophysicist, researcher at Elf Aquitaine

Born January 13, 1931 in Fontenay-sous-Bois. Polytechnic university. He joined the Group at the CEP (Petroleum Exploration Company) and contributed to the creation of the Sysis data processing software. He is a researcher at Elf Aquitaine, working in particular on “vibro-seismic” when he invented the wavelet theory (so called by him) to process signals in oil prospecting. Unfortunately, the Group does not believe in the interest of its discovery (today recognized and used in particular in the JPEG image compression algorithm since version 2000 as well as other applications for complex signal processing). He was put on early retirement in the 1980s. He was later awarded the Reginald Fessenden prize from the Society of Exploration Geophysicists in 1997 and the Grand Prize from the Academy of Technologies in 2001. Died on April 27, 2007. The Total Foundation helped create the Maison Jean-Morlet in International mathematical meeting center of Marseille-Lumigny in 2013.