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Born to a poor family in Metz, France, Poncelet won a scholarship to the lycée and then the École Polytechnique where he studied under Gaspard Monge. In 1810 he entered the military engineering college at Metz. He was commissioned a lieutenant of engineers and served in Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812. Abandoned as dead at the Battle of Krasnoy , he was imprisoned by the Russians at SaratovSaratov is a major city in southern European Russia. It is the capital of Saratov Oblast and a major port on the Volga river. The city was founded in 1590 as a fortress. Saratov became an important shipping port in the 1800s, and developed industrially af before being repatriated to France in 1814Events January 14 Denmark cedes Norway to Sweden January 29 French army of Emperor Napoleon I wins the Battle of Brienne January 31 Gervasio Antonio de Posadas becomes Supreme Director of Argentina. February Congress of Chatillon see George Hamilton Gordo.
During his imprisonment, he studied projective geometry and started to investigate those properties that figures share with their shadowThis article is about the optical phenomenon; for other meanings, see Shadow (disambiguation). A shadow is a dark shape, e. on the ground or a wall, caused by an object (or person, etc. blocking light. Like a silhouette, the shape of the shadow is a two-s, drafting the book Applications d'analyse et de géométrie that was to be published in two volumes in 1862Events January-March January 10 End of term for John Gately Downey, 7th Governor of California. He is succeeded by Amasa Leland Stanford. January 30 The first American ironclad warship, the USS Monitor is launched. February 1 Julia Ward Howe's " Battle Hy/ 1864Events January March January 21 Maori Wars: The Tauranga Campaign starts. February 27 American Civil War: The first Northern prisoners arrive at the Confederate prison at Andersonville, Georgia. March 1- Alejandro Mon Menendez takes office as Prime Minist. He studied conic sectionIn mathematics, a conic section (or just conic is a curved locus of points, formed by intersecting a cone with a plane. The conic sections were named and studied as long ago as 200 BC, when Apollonius of Perga undertook a systematic study of their properts and developed the principle of dualityA dual is a pair a grouping of two. The word duality has a variety of different meanings in different contexts: In physics, duality is present when two different models actually turn out to be equivalent. See duality (physics), wave-particle duality. independently of Joseph Gergonne .
On his repatriation to France, he resumed military engineering duties at Metz, being appointed professor of mechanics at the école d'application in 1825. There, in his lectures, he coined the term fatigue to describe the failure of materials under repeated stress. He took a particular interest in the design of turbines and waterwheels, proposing the inward-flow turbine in 1826, though the first model was not built until 1838.
Poncelet left Metz in 1835 and became professor of mechanics at the Sorbonne in 1838. From 1848, he held the rank of general, commanding the École Polytechnique. Poncelet retired from his administrative duties in 1850 to devote himself to mathematical research. He died in Paris.