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Shots of Science
01.18.2017, by
Discover the 20 scientific images by Canadian researchers presented during the 2016 edition of the competition “La preuve par l’image” (Proof through Images). CNRS Le journal is a partner of Découvrir magazine, published by the Association francophone pour le savoir (Acfas), which has organized this competition since 2010 together with the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and Radio-Canada.
This slideshow was created in collaboration with the magazine Découvrir published by the Association francophone pour le savoir (Acfas). Photographs from the 2015 edition may be viewed here.
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These vestiges of microalgae, known as diatoms, come from lakes in northern Québec. Pleurosigma sp., shown in blue, exhibits remarkable symmetry. This microstructure is in fact the external skeleton of the organism and is made up of silica.
Mélanie AUBIN / Valérie LECOMTE / IOS Services Géoscientifiques
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These bundles of shafts are indium phosphide nanowires. Their three-dimensional structure is of interest to the solar-panel industry since it increases the surface area available for capture of photons emitted by the Sun.
Youcef BIOUD / Université de Sherbrooke
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This network of air-filled tubules (in orange) inside a fruit fly embryo supplies oxygen to its entire body, allowing the microscopic worm on the point of hatching to breathe. Researchers are studying dysfunctions in these tubules, which are very similar to the networks seen in humans, and which are responsible for a number of diseases.
François CHARTIER / Patrick LAPRISE / Université Laval
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This slag is an artificial rock obtained from foundries in which iron is extracted from ore. It may save the Canadian lakes from invasion by cyanobacteria, the blue-green algae that proliferate as phosphorus concentrations increase.
Dominique CLAVEAU-MALLET / Polytechnique Montréal
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In this vascular network inside a rat brain (seen from above), the densest region (top right), which was initially healthy, has been targeted by radiotherapy in order to reproduce the secondary effects of this form of treatment; irradiation occasionally damages the tissue surrounding a tumor by promoting anarchic growth of blood vessels.
Julie CONSTANZO / Martin LEPAGE / Benoit PAQUETTE / Université de Sherbrooke
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This protozoon, Tetrahymena (in blue), a unicellular organism that lives in freshwater, stores the bacteria on which it feeds (in green) inside a digestive vacuole (in orange). The protozoon compresses the remains of its meals into fecal balls (in red).
Alix DENONCOURT / Steve CHARETTE / Richard JANVIER / Université Laval
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Inside a tube, the spinal cord of a mouse is exposed to an arc of light, produced by “light painting,” to show the neuronal circuit of the well-known knee-jerk reflex. The purpose of this study is to improve motor function recovery in spinal cord injury victims.
Yann DEVELLE / Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières
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This macrophage (in blue), a cell that forms part of the immune system, swallows up gold chips (in yellow) at the surface of a rat's retina (in purple) to prevent their build-up in the eye of the animal. Use of these gold nanoparticles has been introduced recently to transport drugs effectively to target cells.
Weimeng DING / Ariel WILSON / Polytechnique Montréal
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To facilitate river navigation, models are created to predict the currents in the St Lawrence River between Québec and Rimouski. Each color represents a direction of current: red for northwards, blue for southwards, etc. The lighter the color, the faster the current.
Pascal DUBE / Institut maritime du Québec
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Daphnia is a very common species of freshwater zooplankton. It uses its antennae to swim and feed. Beneath its transparent shell, its hemoglobin proteins (in orange) transport oxygen. Daphnia makes up the bottom of the food chain for thousands of species.
Maeva GIRAUDO / Magali HOUDE / Guillaume COTTIN / Laboratoire d'écotoxicologie aquatique du Centre Saint-Laurent
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How can crushed glass be recycled while helping with wastewater treatment? When placed in tanks of polluted water, together with a polymer used as a binder, these glass fragments each capture their individual haul of contaminants. This approach to water purification currently appears promising.
Mathieu LAPOINTE / Polytechnique Montréal
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Social network of bacteria obtained by a researcher by shaking hands with 1001 people. He analyzed the DNA of the bacteria collected in this way and assigned a color to each sample. The “threads” link bacteria having at least 95% genetic similarity into what looks like balls of wool.
François-Joseph LAPOINTE / Université de Montréal
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Spinal arthritis, a type of deterioration of the spinal column, may occur with age. In this X-ray, two lumbar vertebrae show zones of degeneration (in yellow and blue). Spinal cord compression in the region of superimposed colors results in loss of patient mobility.
Andrée-Anne MARCHAND / Julie O'SHAUGHNESSY / Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières
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In this representation of a guanine-cytosine nucleic base pair, the bonds between the atomic nuclei have been determined in quantum fashion. The electron density of each atom sharing a region is represented by the small lines converging towards the nuclei.
Chérif MATTA / Université Mount Saint Vincent, Nouvelle-Écosse
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All the cells in our body contain mitochondria that produce energy but slowly burn down the cells. All the cells, that is, except cancer cells (blue nucleus), seen here in a setting of pulmonary arterial hypertension, which refuse to die and deactivate their mitochondria (in orange).
Jolyane MELOCHE / Université Laval
16
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This peregrine falcon chick sports an identification ring that allows scientists to monitor it throughout its entire life. For the last 30 years, scientists have been studying changes in this population, decimated by pollution, on the cliffs of Rankin Inlet in Nunavut (Canada).
Alexandre PAIEMENT / Arctic Raptors
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Inside the nervous system of a fruit fly larva, three pairs of astrocytes (in white) are delicately wrapped around longitudinal neuronal pathways (in blue). We can see clearly that the astrocytes are not randomly distributed but instead systematically cover the same neural territories.
Emilie PECO / Université McGill
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3-D map of a district of Surrey, in British Columbia (Canada), prepared with the help of a LIDAR (light detection and ranging) device. The data collected in this image (number of trees, height, foliage density) can be used to assess the health of urban woodland.
Andrew PLOWRIGHT / Université de la Colombie-Britannique
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The brain's white matter, located below grey matter, is made up of numerous networks of cables comprising axons, the extensions of neurons. In this image, each network is represented by a color. The cables are covered with myelin, a white substance that facilitates the circulation of electrochemical information.
François RHEAULT / Université de Sherbrooke
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The blue shape shown here is the nemesis of the canned food industry, a bacteria that belongs to the Clostridium botulinum species noted for its deadly neurotoxicity. In survival mode, it forms a spore (swollen extremity), a copy of itself, amidst particles of vegetables (in green).
Tony SAVARD / Julien BARRETTE / Denise CHABOT / Agriculture et Agroalimentaire Canada (AAC)
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