Ever since the concept of prehistory was invented, scientists have made a clear distinction between Homo sapiens and Neanderthals, between modern and non-modern humans. Yet according to the prehistoric archaeologist Nicolas Teyssandier, it is this notion of “modernity” that needs to be re-examined...
Opinion
11.15.2018
The town of Angeac, near Angoulême in southwestern France, is hardly a household name. Yet it has a claim to fame, as this is where the bones of one of the world's largest dinosaurs were discovered. In fact, palaeontologists have already identified the...
Article
11.13.2018
After having received the Gruber Prize in Cosmology last May, the astrophysicist Jean-Loup Puget, emeritus senior researcher at the CNRS, was awarded the Shaw Prize in Astronomy on September 26 in Hong Kong. These major prizes are in recognition of the...
Article
11.14.2018
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Opinion
11.09.2018
Nearly 2 million Asians came to the battlefields of Europe and the Middle East during the First World War. From soldiers to factory workers and labourers—some tasked with cleaning the trenches from the horrors of war—their lives were forever changed and would...
Article
11.07.2018
By analyzing the manuscripts of literary works, specialists in 'genetic criticism' can better understand an author's creative process. A closer look at this discipline born from the manuscripts of the German poet Heinrich Heine, and whose...
10.25.2018
After two and a half years sailing across the Pacific to draw up the first-ever global inventory of coral reefs, the schooner Tara has now returned to Lorient (Brittany), her home port in northwestern France. Serge Planes, a world authority on corals, delves...
10.22.2018
By explicitly connecting all base units to fundamental constants, the future reform of the International System of Units (SI) will complete the objectives of universality and stability sought by the inventors of the metric system. Yet what precisely is the...
Article
10.18.2018
Vincent Lafforgue, a senior researcher at the Institut Fourier, has won the Breakthrough Prize 2019 in Mathematics. This distinction rewards his career as a mathematician and especially his research...
Article
10.18.2018
On the occasion of Cosmetic-360, an international trade fair for innovation in the cosmetics industry being held in Paris this week, a quick overview of ongoing research in CNRS laboratories, which...
Article
10.17.2018
Known since Antiquity, Mercury has not yet delivered all its secrets. The international mission BepiColombo, scheduled to launch in the coming days, will study the planet's surface and compare...
10.15.2018
From November 13-16, 2018 in Versailles, the base units of the International System will all be redefined in reference to seven physical constants, whose value will be definitively fixed at the time...
10.10.2018
The Medal of Innovation was awarded on October 10 to Valérie Castellani, Thierry Chartier and Daniel Le Berre. Awarded by the CNRS since 2011, this prize rewards researchers for their outstanding...
10.09.2018
Whether it’s developing smart materials for safer roads or connected medical instruments to help doctors make the best-informed decisions, CNRS research is at the heart of a number of start-ups. We...
Article
10.08.2018
Upon the publication of the IPCC’s Special Report on the Impact of Global Warming of 1.5 °C, three experts who contributed to its drafting—the ecologist Wolgang Cramer, the paleoclimatologist Joël...
Article
10.02.2018
With its sizeable capacity to absorb atmospheric CO2 from greenhouse emissions, the ocean is a key weapon in our fight against global warming, employed in a growing number of climate-regulation and...
10.01.2018
If we are to one day communicate naturally with robots, they will need to master not only speech, but also the subtle yet essential rules of non-verbal communication such as posture and eye...
Article
09.27.2018
The results from a major campaign of lidar mapping in Guatemala caused a sensation early this year, revealing the remains of 60,000 Maya ruins, most of them totally unknown and buried beneath the...
Article
09.27.2018
The 2018 CNRS Gold Medal, France's highest scientific prize, is awarded to the philosopher and Hellenist Barbara Cassin for her work on the world’s languages, the challenges of translation, and...
09.26.2018
This month saw the launch of Sciences 2024, a research project that is unprecedented in France. Its objective is to optimize the performance of French athletes, and to contribute to their success at...