With the Académie des Sciences in 2013-2014

With the AcADémie DeS ScienceS in

2013 - 2014

when the académie gives the floor to its new members

Concepts and Applications of Functional Ecology

Functional ecology focuses on the physiological, morphological, reproductive or behavioural characteristics

of the species, commonly named “functional traits”. Sandra Lavorel has highlighted how much functional

ecology was useful to take on the great global environmental challenges, understand and predict how

climate change and change in land use may impact biodiversity and ecosystems (21 January 2014).

Using Theoretical Chemistry to Better Understand Chemical Reaction?

chemical reactions may be described through the analysis of the properties of electrons and

atomic nuclei. Such a perspective, however, implies to simplify beforehand the systems under

study, which in turn requires preserving the key chemical groups controlling the investigated

properties. Odile eisenstein gave a lecture on the identification of these famous key factors within

her field of research, viz. the catalysis of organometals, and showed that it is based on close

cooperation between theoreticians and experimenters (11 march 2014).

The importance of disordered systems

Although sometimes perceived as a nuisance one must get rid of, disorder is in fact the source of

remarkable physical phenomena. thierry Giamarchi indeed showed that the fundamental modifications

induced by disorder on such systems as the magnetic walls of computer hard drives, or bosons cooled

down at temperatures close to absolute zero, give rise to new, “glassy” physics, which represents one of

the very beautiful challenges of today’s physics (11 march 2014).

Optimal Transportation and Curvature : When Monge, Riemann and Boltzmann Meet

the theory of optimal transportation, non euclidean geometry and static physics have

met about 15 years ago, with the discovery that Ricci curvature may be studied

quantitatively via entropy and monge-Kantorovich transportation. cedric Villani

showed how fruitful such an unexpected encounter has been, boosting each of the

involved branches towards progress (6 may 2014).

the evolutionary story of the coelacanth:

an overview vs. clichés

Long considered a mere fossil, the coelacanth is very much alive as a matter of fact, as evidenced by the specimen hauled up

from the depths 75 years ago offshore the coast of South Africa. The actual coelacanth,

Latimeria chalumnae

, does not have any

fossil representative and is the unique outcome of an evolutionary story that lasted more than 400 million years. Gaël Clément, a

palaeontologist and professor at the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, reviewed the results of study focused on this great fish

from the depths, which is a unique source of information on the “terrestrialization” of vertebrates (11 March 2014).