Poiseuille was born in Paris, France.
From 1815 to 1816 he studied at the École Polytechnique in Paris. He was trained in physics and mathematics. In 1828 he took the degree of a doctor of science with a dissertation entitled Recherches sur la force du coeur aortique. He was interested in the flow of a human blood in narrow tubes.
In 1838 he experimentally derived and in 1840 and 1846 formulated and published the Poiseuille's law (or the Hagen-Poiseuille law also named after Gotthilf Heinrich Ludwig Hagen (1797-1884)) about the voluminal laminar stationary flow of incompressible uniform viscous liquid (so called Newtonian fluid) through a cylindrical tube with the constant circular cross-section, which can be successfully applied for blood flow in capillaries and veins, for air flow in lung alveoli, for the flow through a soda straw or through a hypodermic needle.
He died in Paris.