With the Académie des Sciences in 2013-2014

With the Académie des Sciences in

2013 - 2014

Are Mathematics Useful to Explore the Human Brain?

The developments of physics and biology allow the anatomy and functioning

of the brain to be better understood, thus enabling scientists to model and

emulate them on ever more efficient computer systems. But what about the role

of mathematics? Drawing on some examples from the field of brain imaging,

the member of the Académie des Sciences Olivier Faugeras showed that data

interpretation strongly depends on mathematical tools that use geometry, and

that techniques developed in probability theory make it possible to explain

certain organisational aspects underpinning the activities of great populations

of neurons (28 May 2013).

Académie des Sciences Days in Brittany

Since 1996, on a biennial basis, the Académie holds one of its Tuesday

Sessions outside Paris in order to communicate its work and strengthen

its relationships with the local scientific community. In 2014, it was in the

Britanny:

on 12 May at the marine biology station of Roscoff for a plenary session

focused on biology and marine ecology;

on 13 May at the Espace des Sciences (the Cultural, Scientific, Technical

and Industrial Centre) of Rennes, for a public session to which the 6

laureates of the Young Researcher Brittany Awards had been invited to

introduce their work;

on 14 May at Lycée Descartes in Rennes, for a conference focused on

teaching and training.

The Primordial Universe and Planck’s results

The space mission Planck has observed the microwave radiations that give, with unrivalled precision, an image of the universe at a

very young age. These observations became public at the end of March 2013. They allow researchers to test the hypotheses that

concern the origins of the expansion and of matter. The member of the Académie des Sciences Jean-Loup Puget especially reviewed

the validity of a simple paradigm which provides answers to the difficult questions arising from the classical Big Bang model. This

paradigm develops into multiple models, all sharing the idea that a phase of inflation was at the origin of the expansion and quantum

fluctuations that gave birth to all the structures now visible (28 May 2013).

The Académie at the

Espace des Sciences

of Rennes