Watercolor Labs

Léna is an illustrator. During her vacations, she enjoys capturing landscapes in her travel sketchbook. Suddenly, an absurd idea comes to mind: what if, instead of a bucolic shoreline or a majestic peak, Léna came to paint… our laboratories?

The challenge is set! Heading to the Faculté des Sciences d’Orsay.

Each day, she will discover a new lab, unusual topics, surprising settings, and scientists a bit surprised to see her settled in among their experiments, with her watercolor and brushes in hand. Each time, she’ll have only three hours to sketch the intimate backstage of research in progress…

Welcome to a travel sketchbook like no other…

Today, I’m at ALTO, the Laboratoire de Physique des 2 Infinis, at the heart of nuclear physics. There, I’m discovering an enormous blue tank wich is named TANDEM. It’s not just a tank, no, this giant is a veritable particle accelerator. It swallows up negative ions to project them at incredible speeds, driven by huge electric fields, with almost 15 million volts. Here, beams of particles are produced with sometimes very rare particles to explore the infinitely small, astrophysics, biology, and even nanotechnology.

How can I put onto paper the power of such a machine, and above all, these incrediblous accelerations of invisible particles? I have three hours.

This morning I’m arriving at the  Groupe d’Histoire et de Diffusion des Sciences d’Orsay. There are no machine, no scientific instrument yet this is where research is written, exchanged and discussed. Books, notes and pationated discussions are everywhere. The history of mathematics, biology, physics and even teaching are studied here. It is a past and present observations of how practices are formed, how knowledge circulates.

Step by step, I’m understanding that science is also built on ideas and words. The invisible laboratory lives through those who are gathered there.

But how can I draw it?

It’s up to me!

Today, I’m discovering the Institut Diversité, Écologie et Évolution du Vivant. I’m coming into large greenhouses where insects and plants are the stars. Giant maize, melon shoots, beans, wild apple trees and other fascinating specimens…

Here we study ecology, genetics and the mysterious mechanisms of the living genome. How do plants adapt to environmental change? How do they interact with insects? What about transgenic plants? These are just some questions that scientists are trying to answer in this strange laboratory. 

Now it is my turn to use my tools to reveal the superpowers of life.

New day, new setting: I’m discovering ELYSE, a unique electron accelerator at the Institut de Chimie Physique. It is just ten metres long but it is nothing like the usual particle accelerators. And yet it opens the door into a new world for chemists.

Here, the very first moments of chemical reactions are tracked, those last just a few picoseconds. A laser triggers tiny electrons packets that are sent onto the samples. Scientists and experimenters analyse then the light emitted, like they are leafing through a photo album: image by image, the story of the chemical reaction is revealed… This is a place where time can be read through light.

Now it’s my turn to capture these fleeting moments.

Today, I’m taking a look at the MET, the Transmission Electron Microscope used by the Institut de Chimie Moléculaire et des Matériaux d’Orsay. It doesn’t look like an optical microscope at first sight. Here, this is not light, but electrons wich are propelled into samples at very high speed through an ultra-high vacuum column! Thanks to their quantum properties, they interact with atoms, enabling observations to be made from the diameter of a hair to the scale of a nanometre. I am diving inside a cell, into the heart of a virus, among interstellar particles or into the study of metals and their deformations.

How can I reveal the power of such an instrument with my simple brushes? It’s up to me.

This morning I’m visiting the Laboratoire des Mathématiques d’Orsay, located in a green setting. Here, the blackboard is the star, even in the gardens!

Harmonic analysis, algebraic geometry, topology… these mysterious subjects seem to reveal a fascinating diversity.

A few equations remain on the walls, the last traces of lively debates. The spirit of exchange animates this place. Are mathematics an universal language? Yes, but it is also a collective adventure.

Now I’m trying to represent these peaks of abstraction…

New place, new rooms: here I am at the Institut des Sciences Moléculaires d’Orsay. In front of me, pumps, lenses, lasers, and even an ultra-high vacuum tunnel are piled up… This is not just one, but five cutting-edge experiments that are taking place in this machine. And it’s not just about shining but sending flashes of light so incredibly briefly that they reveal the mysteries of matter on unprecedented scales!

Now I have to solve a mystery: how can I make visible something that lasts just only a millionth of a billionth of a second?

Time to let colors taking this moment.

This morning, I’m discovering the Institut des Neurosciences Paris-Saclay. In this lab, I’m surrounded by an incredible array of high-tech prosthetics, motors, robotic arms, cameras, and detectors. This is a complete toolkit to better understand the brain and its behavior.

That’s the real challenge here: improving the quality of life for people with prosthetics and reducing their pain.

But how can I capture an experiment trying to explore what is the most intimate to us: our brain?

Time to put mine to work!

Today, I’m discovering the WILDER platform at the Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Sciences du Numérique.

I’m standing in front of 75 high-definition screens displaying the most incredible images. They are ready to be explored and analyzed in the finest detail, from molecules to works of art.

Suddenly, I’m projected into the cosmos. The very recent images from the Euclid satellite are appearing in front of me… A place where the smallest and the largest are revealed in every detail.

Now, it’s my turn to reveal the beauty of the Universe.

The final stop of my journey takes me to the Laboratoire des Géosciences Paris-Saclay. I’m seeing incredible rocks in every corners: granite, limestone, sandstone, basalt and many others. Here, samples are ready to be analysed to reveal the mysterious secrets of Earth.

One instrument catches my eye: the laser granulometer. This tool measures particle sizes and tells us about the distribution of clays and sands. One way of unlocking the mysteries of our subsoils…

It’s up to me to find out what secrets lie beneath our feet.