Max Wien

Max Karl Werner Wien was born on 25 December 1866 in Königsberg (now Kaliningrad, Russia), then located in the Kingdom of Prussia, the son of the co-owner of the well-known Castell grain company, Otto Wien. He was a cousin of physicist and Nobel laureate Wilhelm Wien.

After studying in Königsberg and Freiburg, Wien entered the University of Berlin, where he studied under Hermann von Helmholtz and August Kundt. In 1888, he received his Ph.D. under Helmholtz. In 1892, he worked under Wilhelm Röntgen at the University of Würzburg, where in 1893 he received his habilitation, qualifying him to be a professor.

In 1898, Wien moved to Technische Hochschule Aachen, where he became an extraordinary professor the following year. In 1904, he became a full professor at Technische Hochschule Danzig (now Gdańsk University of Technology). In 1911, he was appointed Director of the Institute of Physics at the University of Jena, a position he held until his death in 1938.