Jean Charles Athanase Peltier (22.02.1785-27.10.1845) was a French physicist. He was born in Ham. Until 1815 he was a watchmaker in Paris, and then took up physical research.
His work concerned electromagnetism, thermoelectricity, atmospheric electricity and the design of electrical measuring instruments. In 1834 he found that at the junctions of two different metals heat is released or absorbed, depending on the direction of the current (the Peltier effect).