As a teenager, Claire dreamed of being a painter, a designer or an architect before developing a strong attraction to biology in high school. This passion, which has not left her since, allowed her to enter the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. Claire then went to Strasbourg for her PhD where she recreated neural networks in vitro to study the spontaneous generation of nerve activity. After her doctorate, she flew off to Nepal and Tibet where she spent one year teaching science through experiments in local schools. After twelve months away from research, she went to the US for a postdoctoral fellowship at Berkeley University to work on optogenetics, a young discipline that was still in its infancy back then. In 2011, Claire formed her own research group at the Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle Epinière in Paris and became INSERM Research Director in 2017. Her research is based on sensory-motor integration. She studies the nervous system of larvae of the transparent zebrafish, whose small number of neurons - about 200,000 - allows for quantitative biology. On issues related to locomotion and posture control, she questions the link between neuronal connectivity and gene expression. The sensory system fascinates her, especially the relation between external stimuli and the flow of internal information. But she is also interested in the individuality of the zebrafish. What differences can be observed from one individual to another? When can one talk about the expression of the fish personality?
Claire fell in love with the aesthetics of this cyprinid. "The visualization of the gene expression is, each time, a very emotional moment», she admits. She sees photography as a "great means of sharing" and regularly goes to schools to make science accessible through her images.

Photographs made in collaboration with Kristen Severi & Martin Carbo-Tano.

Artworks from Claire:

After studying physics in Buenos Aires, Argentina, José-Eduardo flew off to Saclay, France where he did his PhD on the Rayleigh-Bénard convection, a hydrodynamic instability well known to meteorologists. He then joined the Laboratory Physics and Mechanics of Heterogeneous Media at ESPCI Paris. Today Emeritus Research Director at the CNRS, José-Eduardo has worked throughout his career on instabilities in fluid mechanics, chaos and turbulence. His work, mainly experimental, focuses on the destabilization of fluids when passing around an obstacle. He has notably developed optical methods for visualization and measurement in fluid mechanics. He has also worked as a scientific consultant for Schlumberger and met Sophie Goujon-Durand on this occasion. Together, they were working on the design of a flowmeter; a subject for fundamental research was born out of an industrial interest.
José-Eduardo has developed a genuine interest in the history of science and the role of visualization in fluid mechanics. Hydrodynamics is a "science on a human scale", he likes "the expressive richness of the image". He is also very attached to scientific popularization. He has been the scientific secretary of a series of exhibitions on Chaos that took place in Barcelona or in the Palais de la Découverte in Paris. José-Eduardo also evokes the "temptation of pure aesthetics" in his experiments: "Although my experiments are naturally designed on the basis of scientific relevance, I am always amazed by the beauty of flows in fluid mechanics."

Artworks from José-Eduardo:

Benjamin's scientific journey began at ESPCI Paris where he did his PhD on hydrodynamic instabilities. He had the opportunity to expand his knowledge of fluid mechanics, in particular turbulence, during his post-doctorate. He then left France for the United States, New York University, where he focused on a topic that still keeps him busy today: biomimicry. The idea of ​​understanding, taking inspiration from and reproducing in the laboratory what nature has put millions of years to build fascinated him. In 2009, Benjamin formed his own research group around this topic: swimming fish, flying insects, collective behavior in animals, are typical examples of subjects he wanted to investigate in his laboratory. With Raphaël Candelier, which we also count among our artist-researchers, part of his research is now dedicated to social interactions between fish.
Benjamin has been practicing photography since he was 18, and has never really stopped expressing his art since. He likes simplicity, minimalism. "I like photographs that arouse one's curiosity. What interests me is the mystery surrounding an image", he confides. Benjamin discovered scientific photography during his PhD and found quickly the depth he was looking for. Benjamin is an esthete who gives a graphic dimension to everything related to his research. "The scientific message is greatly served when wrapped in an elegant package", says Benjamin who, undoubtedly, shares the philosophy of AiR.

Artworks from Benjamin:

During his PhD at the FAST laboratory at Paris-Sud University, Thomas focused on hydrodynamic instabilities and was particularly interested in turbulent mixtures induced by gravity. He then flew off to Chile where he did a post-doctorate at the University of Santiago. His research was devoted to the study of Faraday's instability which appears when one forces the vibration of a liquid interface at high frequency and high amplitude. His journey on the other side of the Atlantic continued in Canada for a second post-doctorate where he investigated the dynamics of fluid mixing. Finally, he joined the Jean Perrin laboratory at the Pierre et Marie Curie University where he obtained a position as a CNRS researcher. Today, he focuses primarily on immiscible fluids, and is particularly interested in the destabilization mechanisms of bubbles at interfaces.
Thomas spends long hours making his experiments appear as elegant as possible, and tries to capture those moments of harmony with his camera. "My work, and the way I represent it, must be a reflection of my personality," he says.

The series "Crack patterns" was made in collaboration with Virgile Thievenaz.

Artworks from Thomas:

Unconventionnal is the least one could say about Yannick's journey. Yannick began his academic career with a doctorate in chemistry devoted to the study of artificial enzymes at the University Paris Descartes. He then flew off to Japan for a post-doctorate in biophysics at the University of Tokyo. He focused his research on molecular motors: nanometric workers ensuring mechanical tasks in living cells. At this point, Yannick decides to take a year off to travel around the world. After crossing the Kamchatka peninsula on foot, he decides to cross Africa by bike. In 2009, he publishes "L’Afrique à l’envers : Du Cap au Caire, à vélo" published at Les Sources du Maica. Upon his return, he worked as a journalist for a while and became a consultant in technological creativity and innovation. Eventually, Yannick returns to research and enters the CNRS at the Franco-Japanese laboratory of the University of Tokyo. Since 2008 Yannick has been interested in DNA-based molecular programming. He uses the tools of synthetic chemistry to process information. He joins the ESPCI Paris in 2016 to create his own research group within the Gulliver laboratory. Today, he is also interested in the development of diagnostic tools for the detection of enzymes.
Yannick truly values the importance of graphic representation, essential for him to interpret the data. The aesthetic component is omnipresent in his research; the images he produces must leave a mark, impact: "I like to add an aesthetic value to a successful experiment », he says.

Artworks from Yannick:

Although Matthieu seemed to be destined for quantum mechanics, he decided to substitute the aesthetics of visual experiences for the abstraction of invisible objects. It was during a course on hydrodynamic instabilities that he decided to follow the path of fluid mechanics. During his PhD in Bordeaux, Matthieu worked on the destabilization of liquid crystal drops. After a short experience at the Institut de Physique de Rennes, he crossed the Atlantic to work alongside Professor Howard Stone at Princeton University. It is when his colleague Arnaud Saint-Jalmes paid him a visit that he discovered the surface flow experiment that keeps him busy today. Ready to leave the laboratory after several unsuccessful attempts, the two researchers decided to empty the sample into the sink. Surprisingly enough, they observed volutes, precious witnesses of the phenomenon they were initially looking for. At the frontier between fluid mechanics and physico-chemistry at interfaces, Matthieu developed the experiment and pushed it to its limits. He quickly found applications that attracted the attention of companies wanting to test their chemical formulations in cosmetics or the oil industry. He joined the CNRS in 2014 after a second post-doctorate at the Laboratoire de Physique du Solide in Orsay.
Matthieu enjoys using everyday objects to illustrate the complexity of the phenomena he is studying. He attaches great importance to the aesthetics of soft matter: "Not only is it beautiful, but many of the phenomena that surround us in everyday life are still misunderstood to this day," he says.

Artworks from Matthieu:

Pascal is fascinated by the growth of shapes in nature. He began his academic career with a thesis at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris where he studied the regulation and expression of genes in bacteria. After a short experience at the Harvard Medical School and a post-doc in Heidelberg, Germany, Pascal joins the CNRS to build his own research team. He is interested in the growth and evolution of shapes in diatoms which are microscopic algae found in all waters of the world. In 2010, he joins the National Museum of Natural History and orientates his research towards bio-mineralization, particularly on the mechanisms of skeletal formation in corals or molluscs. Part of his research is still devoted to the study of the diatom structure, but with a notable particularity: Pascal studies and meticulously maps the diatoms present in Parisian water! He is able, according to the species he observes under his microscope, to identify the neighbourhood from which the sample comes. But Pascal has more than a string to his bow, and his research knows no boundaries. Supported by the CNRS, he creates in 2016 a Man-Environment Observatory in Guadeloupe. The idea is to study the evolution of the socio-ecosystem in response to a so-called "structuring" fact: the harbour extension of Point-à-Pitre.
Pascal wonders about the intrinsic aesthetics of the objects he photographs. "It's probably their inessential beauty that fascinates me. In contrast to male butterflies that display their most beautiful colors in order to attract females, diatoms are beautiful by nature, even if they do not need to. It's fascinating! » He admits enthusiastically. Pascal spends long hours sublimating these micro-organisms: "it is a way for me to pay tribute to these wonderful creatures".

Artworks from Pascal-Jean:

Sophie studied physics at the Polytechnic School in Warsaw and did her PhD on hydrodynamic instabilities. She then came to France to become an engineer at the Schlumberger research center in Montrouge. After 18 years in the industry, Sophie joined academia and became a lecturer-researcher at the University Paris-Est Créteil. Her experience at Schlumberger allowed her to keep an industrial look at her research, a feature particularly appreciated by her new colleagues. She never lost sight of the potential applications in the experiments she implemented. She met José-Eduardo Wesfreid on the occasion of an industrial mission at Schlumberger to design a flow-meter. Since then, they have never stopped working together. They are particularly interested in the wakes of fluids flowing around objects of variable geometry. They have also developed the theme of "active control": how to amplify or destroy, in a controlled way, vortices that form behind obstacles? Sophie often gives the example of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in the United States, which in 1940 began to oscillate dramatically (video): "What people ignore is that the bridge entered into resonance because of the vortices formed behind the beams beaten by the wind!", she says.

Artworks from Sophie:

During his PhD, Eric worked on granular media and in particular on the propagation of sound in a network of beads. After a year spent at Ecole Normale Supérieure as a contingent scientist, he worked at the National Center for Space Studies (CNES) and made his experiments travel in a rocket to study their behavior under micro-gravity. Eric then joined the CNRS at Ecole Normale Supérieure in Lyon where he contributed in particular to a deeper understanding of the Branly effect. This mechanism - at the basis of the first wireless telecommunications between Paris and London in the 1880s - had been widely used but only little understood. In 2005, he joined the Laboratory Matières et Systèmes Complexes and formed his own research group on topics related to wave turbulence. But space never really left Eric. Today, he works with the astronaut Thomas Pesquet on experiments carried out in weightlessness, and coordinates an international team working on the design of an instrument to study granular media aboard the International Space Station. Beyond its fundamental interests, this study would allow to solve practical problems such as drilling under low gravity or sanding faced by the Rovers on Mars.
Eric regularly takes part in events combining Arts and Sciences. With his friend and colleague Claude Laroche, they take great pleasure in sublimating and magnifying the scientific objects they investigate.

Artworks from Eric:

Florence is interested in the physics of our daily lives, from soap films to shaving cream. From her Ph.D. until her position as a permanent researcher in Paris, her work has been devoted to the physics of magnetic and soapy foams. Her research activities notably led her to take interest into the acoustics of these bubbly media: what physico-chemical factors influence the propagation of sound in a foam? Can certain frequencies be attenuated for the benefit of others when sound waves pass through the medium? So many questions that have motivated Florence in the past years. The potential applications of her research are numerous, especially for filtering and sound isolation. Florence is now working with marine biologists to understand the formation mechanisms of marine mosses: linked to the rapid growth of microscopic algae, they are found every year on our shores.
The visual aspect of experiments is extremely important to Florence. The beauty of scientific objects has been a driving force, a guide for her career choices. "I try to [...] communicate scientific messages with interactive and visual experiences," she says. In short, in full accordance with the philosophy of AiR.

Artworks from Florence:

After graduating from Ecole Centrale de Lyon and Imperial College London, Alexandre took a year off from his scientific career to discover and photograph the world. Back in Paris he’s then determined to focus on fundamental research. After a master's degree in physics at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris, he did a PhD at ESPCI Paris where he specialized in liquid crystals. He was particularly interested in the intricate behavior of these elongated molecules when they are placed on curved surfaces. Alexandre developed a real fascination for these objects that interact with light in such a spectacular manner. This is actually why liquid crystals are extensively used in screens and displays.
"Looking at liquid crystals through a microscope is like looking at the stars through a telescope. The scales are different, but the magic is just the same", he says. Alexandre has long been passionate about photography (www.alexandredarmon.com). With liquid crystals, his microscope and three years ahead of him, Alexandre found the ideal playground to let his creativity flourish. It was during a stay in Kyoto that he found a way to combine his passion for photography with his love of science. Alexandre creates AiR - Art in Research and now devotes all his energy to promoting scientific research through images.

Artworks from Alexandre:

As a science lover since childhood, Pierre-Philippe Crépin attended his first courses in quantum physics at the Ecole Polytechnique. For him, it is simply the “discovery of a new world”. Seized by this “elegant, abstract and magic” field, he pursued a master’s degree in quantum physics at the Ecole Normale Supérieure. As part of his training, he joined the Kastler-Brossel Laboratory to study cold atoms. He stayed in this laboratory to undertake a PhD on the nothing less than original question : does antimatter fall down or up ? With his supervisor Serge Reynaud, he proposes new experimental methods, based on the quantum theory, in order to improve the accuracy of measurement of the gravitational acceleration of antimatter. He enjoys when mathematics lead to surprising results that can be in practice physically verifiable. After his research projects in quantum mechanics, Pierre-Philippe will apply his theoretical and analytical knowledge to economic problems during his post-doctorate in econophysics. Pierre-Philippe has always considered image as an essential tool for science. Images are a “great guide for intuition” for him. More still, Pierre-Philippe’s gaze sympathizes with visual beauty, in cinema as well as in museums. “I like when form reveals the deep meaning of an object”, he confides. He has been incorporating an esthetic side to his analytical approaches since the beginning of his research. Today, he develops his search for beauty in the visualization of his results.

Artworks from Pierre-Philippe:

Alain Couté’s research career is undoubtedly atypical. In parallel to his scientific studies in Paris, he started working as a high school supervisor and PE teacher in the provinces. Then, he joined the military navy to teach sailing, dreaming of embarking on « L’Etoile » or « La Belle Poule », flagships of the French fleet. His experience as a sailing teacher continued during two years at the Ecole Navale. Back in Paris, he passed with success his certificates: physics, chemistry, biology… while working as a physics teacher and geology thesis translator from German to French. He was ranked first at his Master’s degree in Algology, and gained a lot of knowledge during his numerous field trips. His PhD was dedicated to the study of endemic macroscopic algae in the region of Banyuls, France. He was the first to cultivate these algae outside their natural environment — Quai Saint-Bernard in Paris. At the same time, he learned scuba diving and became instructor. Then, he applied for the French National Museum of Natural Histories where he was enrolled as a research assistant. He became assistant professor, lecturer and assistant director of the Cryptogamy lab. Eventually, he ran the Cryptogamy lab for ten years. Ever since he entered the Museum, he has put all his energy in the study of microscopic algae, which he meticulously lists and has become a world-class specialist. Today, he goes regularly to new Caledonia in order to catalog the algae of this archipelago.
Alain taught himself terrestrial and underwater photography. His research, which involves using photography on a daily basis, helped developing his artistic sensibility. Expert in optical and electronic microscopy, his practice as a photographer is a real painstaking job. Constantly looking for perfection, every alga is dried and isolated from its environnement using micro-pipettes. Besides him, only a handful of people are able to manipulate algae as he does — photographing an isolated alga can take up to ten hours. Today, Alain claims to be « a researcher, a drawer, a photographer and a field man », and transmits with passion his experience to the youngest.

Artworks from Alain:

Rosa’s interest in medical research started in high school. After joining the École Centrale de Paris, she completed a DEA in molecular biophysics at Paris VI where she became passionate about neuroscience. It was after an internship at the Port-Royal maternity at Cochin Hospital that she decided to pursue this path. Today, Rosa is director of research at the CNRS and director of the Mediterranean Neurobiology Institute in Marseille. Rosa’s team is interested in the connections between neurons in the hippocampus, a region of the brain that stores our memory and that helps us find our way in space. More specifically, Rosa has shown that the neurons that are generated first, during the embryonic development, play a more important role in the hippocampal network. Even if applications are at the heart of Rosa's research, she remains very attached to fundamental research and questions related to the understanding of the brain are a source of daily motivation for her. Rosa is the 2019 winner of the Liliane Bettencourt Prize for Life Sciences, one of the most prestigious awards for research in biology.
Rosa often compares the profession of researcher with that of artist. For her, both must interpret data and express a form of creativity. She never ceases to marvel at the beauty of neurons that is at the root of her passion for neuroscience.

Photographs taken in collaboration with Agnès Baude.

Artworks from Rosa:

In 1970, after graduating from the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications (ENST), Jean-François ran the research division in a joint laboratory between ENST and Ecole Polytechnique (X). While the development of computers were still at a very early stage, Jean-François was a pioneer: he notably designed softwares dedicated to computer-assisted teaching (operating system, file structure management, text editors, graphical software, etc.). All this with a computer with 32 KB of RAM and 1.5 MB of hard drive!
Pierre Vasseur, back then director of research at X and aware of the potential offered by images in the field of scientific communication, brought him to the Center for Applied Mathematics run by Jean-Claude Nédélec. Jean-François then focused almost exclusively on scientific visualization. He thought deeply about the proper ways to represent numerical calculations, and became a valuable adviser in computer imaging for many researchers at Ecole Polytechnique.
Passionate about Flemish painting, Jean-François puts all his knowledge at the service of artistic creation. In his fifty-year-long career, he produced several thousand images and animations on his computer. They are the fruit of a subtle blend of imagination and mathematical reality; his creativity knows no limit. Jean-François is also very attached to scientific diffusion. He gave countless lectures and interventions in schools, where he used his images to raise awareness about the importance of fundamental research: "It's not by modernizing the candle that we invented the electric bulbs », he confides with humor.

Artworks from Jean-François:

For Raphael, it all began during an internship in Japan in behavioral neuroscience, more precisely psycho-acoustics. After obtaining a master's degree in cognitive science, Raphael flew off to Italy to study the collective dynamics of starlings, whose flight has been fascinating passers-by at Rome's railway station for many years. He then returned to France to do a PhD in statistical physics. But after defending his thesis Raphael comes back to his first love, neuroscience, to investigate the mechano-sensorial issue of fingerprints. He is currently working as a researcher in the Jean Perrin laboratory where he studies flows of information in the brain of the transparent zebrafish.
Raphaël attaches great importance to graphic representation in his results. He is always looking for the most visual, the most relevant, the most harmonious." I only understand when I see, [...] I'm sure of nothing until I've seen it", he confesses.

Artworks from Raphaël:

Charles's scientific career began in Austin, Texas, where he did a PhD in fluid mechanics on turbulent flows. He then came to Europe to do his post-doc at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. In 2002, Charles obtained a researcher/lecturer position at Ecole Polytechnique where he set up his own research team to work on fluid flows at very small scales: microfluidics. Transportation of bubbles and drops or modeling of micro-channel networks mimicking the functioning of the lungs are two examples of Charles’ achievements. He also developed technological tools allowing the manipulation of drops in these micro-channels. In 2012, his tools found practical applications in cell biology and gave a new direction to his research. Since December 2017, Charles has been leading a bio-engineering team between Ecole Polytechnique and Institut Pasteur. Although biology is now at the heart of his research activities, Charles is a physicist and each of his experiments is an opportunity for him to question the underlying physical phenomena.
The visual aspect of fluid mechanics experiments has fascinated Charles since he was a student. He likes the science "that you can see with your own eyes". Charles tells us he is color-blind, which he sees as a benefit to his research. He uses mostly black and white in his images and this allows him to take a particular look at his research: "I'm not distracted by colors and naturally am much more sensitive to shapes and movement, ubiquitous in fluid mechanics".

Photographs made in collaboration with Nicolas Taccoen & Sebastien Sart.

Artworks from Charles: