Chemist Édouard Bénédictus, the inventor of the laminated glass, was from which country?

Laminated glass is a type of safety glass that holds together when shattered. In the event of breaking, it is held in place by an interlayer, typically of polyvinyl butyral (PVB) or ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA), between its two or more layers of glass. The interlayer keeps the layers of glass bonded even when broken, and its high strength prevents the glass from breaking up into large sharp pieces.

Laminated glass was invented in 1903 by the French chemist Édouard Bénédictus (1878-1930), inspired by a laboratory accident. A glass flask had become coated with the plastic cellulose nitrate and when dropped shattered but did not break into pieces. However, it was not until 1909 that Benedictus filed a patent, after hearing about a car accident where two women were severely injured by glass debris. In 1911, he formed the Société du Verre Triplex, which fabricated a glass-plastic composite to reduce injuries in car accidents. Production of Triplex glass was slow and painstaking, making it expensive. It was not immediately widely adopted by automobile manufacturers, but laminated glass was widely used in the eyepieces of gas masks during World War I.