High energy channelling and the experimental search for the internal clock predicted by Louis de Broglie

This paper gives a short review of the past and recent activities of the Atomic Collisions in Solids Lyon-group, in collaboration with other groups, in the field of high energy channelling. The ion-channelling programme was performed at GANIL-Caen and at GSI-Darmstadt. The electron-channelling programme started at ALS-Saclay for relativistic incident energies and was then extended to SPS-CERN for ultra-relativistic energies. The last part of this paper presents the electron-channelling experiments performed originally at ALS-Saclay, then at BTF-Frascati and more recently at LS-Saga, in order to observe the electron “internal clock” predicted in 1924 by L. de Broglie.