a pale blue dot

Captured by the Voyager 1 satellite, “Pale Blue Dot” remains the most distant photograph of Earth, taken from nearly 6 billion kilometers away. This image gave its name to our exhibition: nine square posters to tell the story of Earth from new perspectives. The images herebelow are in French, but the pdf file contains all posters in english.

Feel free to download it, print it, and display it!

Ça pollue beaucoup un·e scientifique par rapport au reste de la société ?

“Kim K vs 1000 scientifiques”  est un jeu hyper intuitif qui compare 2 empreintes carbone :
– celle liée à nos activités humaines (faire tourner un hôpital, 1 semaine de Fashion Week…)
– celle de la recherche (faire tourner un labo de chimie, fabriquer un accélérateur de particules…).

Histoire de clarifier un peu la notion d’empreinte carbone et de discuter de l’impact de la recherche.

Bon à savoir : les valeurs sont en “kilotonne équivalent CO2”. Une kilotonne, c’est 1000 tonnes. Et une tonne équivalent CO₂, c’est l’unité de mesure pour évaluer l’impact moyen de tous les gaz à effet de serre sur le réchauffement climatique.

“Ça chauffe chez les scientifiques”, c’est une expo originale sur les scientifiques face à la crise environnementale. Elle existe en grand format, mais on l’a aussi conçue en format nomade, facile à envoyer pour que vous puissiez l’afficher ! Si ça vous intéresse, toutes les infos sont ici.

Si vous êtes intéressés, écrivez-nous. 

Museum curator, that’s the new title I’ll be able to add to my resume!

To create this exhibition, I spent four months interning with the La Physique Autrement team:
– finding a theme for the exhibition
– listening to Julien’s physics lectures
– exploring the museum to discover its every nook and cranny
– gaining inspiration by visiting numerous exhibitions
– and, above all, interacting with all the team members.

Then came the time for experimentation. I worked on the media, materials, volumes, illustrations, typography… And I was finally able to find the identity of my exhibition. This was followed by a phase of writing texts, translating the scientific content into drawings, then into volumes, shaping the cubes, and even making paper!

The first cubes were only truly born after the third month. Once the exhibition was completed, I was able to film and photograph it from every angle before showing it to the general public.

Here are some behind-the-scenes photos of this charming journey.

Comment envahir de grands espaces avec de la physique ? En collant des stickers partout ! C’est pour cela qu’on vous a mis nos meilleures anecdotes de physique sur des stickers de 10x10cm. Un record absolu !

D’où vient le claquement du fouet ? Quelle est la vitesse la plus lente jamais mesurée ? Vaut-il mieux courir ou marcher sous la pluie ?

Les visiteurs s’amusent à retrouver les stickers et associer les questions et réponses. Ça marche dans les 2 sens, qu’on tombe sur la réponse ou la question en premier.

Ne tardez-pas, faites-les imprimer et collez-en partout, dans les toilettes, les halls d’entrée ou les musées, les wagons du RER B (en demandant l’autorisation avant bien sûr) !

Les fichiers d’impression des stickers sont ci-dessous.

Faites-les faire en noir ou en blanc (ou les deux) sur du vinyle transparent autocollant.

Nous on a confié cette tâche à Signarama Paris 18.

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…
You can find the sketches in videos, or in a watercolor sketchbook.

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.

A lecture narrated by Julien Bobroff and illustrated live with Lisa Dehove’s object manipulations. Four chapters that shed light on the basic concepts of quantum physics, using a good old-fashioned overhead projector and colorful, poetic, and surprising objects. You’ll learn everything from wave packet reduction to entanglement, and you’ll leave with your head full of images!

In addition to the printed transparencies that usually accompanied the overhead projectors, the conference objects used a whole host of heterogeneous materials: rice, semolina, brass and glass tubes, performance gelatins, cardboard, magnets, sweets, lenses, etc. Chosen for their shape or their transparency, they took the scientific discourse into a teeming, colorful and poetic universe, while allowing quantum theory to be explained with images and metaphors that were both striking and precise.

The lecture is divided into four chapters. Each chapter includes two parts: one to explain a fundamental principle of quantum physics, and the second to discuss a recent research article related to that principle. Mat pockets allow you to arrange and organize all the objects and transparencies to be handled for each section. A color code and numbers help you navigate the lecture sequence and the order of the actions to be performed.

Les scientifiques nous alertent depuis des années sur la crise environnementale. Mais la pratique de la recherche elle-même est loin d’être écologique ou durable ! Qu’ont-ils et elles à répondre à ça ? Cela a-t-il encore un sens de faire de la recherche aujourd’hui ?

On a été poser la question à 9 scientifiques : directrice de labo, étudiant·es en sciences, doctorant en climatologie, astrophysicienne, chercheur·euses en écologie, chercheur en optique quantique, chercheuse en agronomie …

Vous allez voir, il y a du débat ! Certain·es se mobilisent pour repenser les pratiques de la recherche, d’autres considèrent que cela freine la progression de leur travail et de la recherche en général. Ça divise, ça met mal à l’aise, ça pose des questions presque existentielles.

L’expo est structurée en plusieurs pôles et il y en a pour tous les goûts : l’introduction qui pose le problème + les chiffres de l’empreinte carbone de la recherche + les débats que tout cela soulève + les initiatives qui dépassent ces questions insolubles + ce que serait la recherche idéale des personnes interviewées + des livres, BDs, podcasts, chansons pour aller plus loin. Sans oublier les messages laissés par les scientifiques pour les visiteur·euses et un espace pour leur en laisser à votre tour !

Visite express de l’expo

Pour le montage de l’exposition au Musée des Arts et Métiers, nous avons enrichi l’exposition de 3 vitrines uniques.

Ne passez surtout pas à côté du cahier “Ça chauffe les méninges”, spécialement conçu pour accompagner votre visite ! Ce petit carnet est à emporter, gribouiller, annoter, partager… Servez-vous au début de l’expo, il y en a de toutes les couleurs.

Un sacré boulot

Vous aimeriez ramener l’exposition chez vous mais 18 tipis de 2 mètres de haut c’est un peu encombrant ? Pas de problème on a la solution pour vous : “Ça chauffe” chez les scientifiques se décline en version nomade !

L’intégralité des panneaux miniaturisés tient sur 6 grilles d’exposition. À vous de les disposer dans le hall de votre labo, les couloirs de votre lieu de travail, ou même à la cantine !

Vous nous la demandez, on vous l’envoie, et vous nous la renvoyez pour qu’elle profite à d’autres.

11 étudiant·es du DSAA 1 Design d’Exposition de l’École Boulle

3 encadrant·es

3 sujets scientifiques de pointe

3 prix Nobel

5 jours pour monter une exposition à la BU Orsay

5 jours de grand bleu

7 caisses de matériel de prototypage

8 paquets de biscuits

1 workshop inédit de La Physique Autrement

À vous de juger si le défi a été relevé ! ⤵️

3 chercheuses et chercheurs de l’Université Paris-Saclay, 3 découvertes de pointe, 3 Nobels de physique

Here’s an exhibition of 10 posters to help you discover quantum physics: 5 basic concepts, each illustrated by a recent discovery. Are you a teacher, student, scientist, science museum attendee, or just an amateur? This is the perfect exhibition to introduce you to this strange discipline. Download, print, and share for free. Labs and institutions can also adapt the posters to their own research upon request.

If you are a research team, a laboratory, or an institution, and you would like to highlight your own research in one or more of the “research” posters at the exhibition, please do not hesitate to contact us by sending an email to laphysiqueautrement@gmail.com, and we will help you.