Doodle tribute to test chart inventor

An animated Google Doodle to celebrate what would have been the 181st birthday of decimal sight test chart inventor and French ophthalmologist, Ferdinand Monoyer, was sent live this week.

Monoyer developed the dioptre unit of measurement for the optical power of a lens and each row on his eye chart represented a different dioptre, which calculated the distance you would have to be from the text to read it.

Monoyer also inserted his name into the chart. Reading upwards, ignoring the last line, the letters on the left-hand side spell ‘Monoyer.’