About the Museum

The Musée Édouard Branly (French pronunciation: [myze ədwaʁ bʁɑ̃li]) is a museum dedicated to the work of radio pioneer Édouard Branly (1844―1940). It is located in the 6th arrondissement at the Institut Catholique de Paris-ISEP, 21, rue d'Assas, Paris, France, and open by appointment only. The museum contains the research laboratory and equipment used by Édouard Branly, a physics professor at the Institut Catholique de Paris and inventor of the first widely used radio receiver, the Branly coherer circa 1884―1886. Its collection includes a number of early devices used in wireless experiments, such as electrolytic detectors, insulated tubes filled with metal filings, a Righi oscillator, generators, electromagnets, metallic blades mounted on glass, electrical contacts, and a column of six steel balls stacked in a glass cylinder.