The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) announced the election of 84 new members and 21 foreign associates from 15 countries in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. Two French foreign associates were nominated this year: Denis Duboule and Philippe Sansonetti.

Denis Duboule is a professor at the Department of Genetics & Evolution (formerly the Department of Zoology and Animal Biology) at the University of Geneva in Switzerland. He holds both Swiss and French citizenship. More information on his current research in developmental genomics is available at http://genev.unige.ch/en/users/Denis-Duboule/unit.

Philippe Sansonetti is a professor at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France. His research focuses on Shigella, Gram-negative bacteria that cause dysentery and the development of a vaccine against bacillary dysentery. More information can be found at http://www.pasteur.fr/recherche/unites/Pmm/index_gb.html.

Those elected to the NAS bring the total number of active members to 2,152 and the total number of foreign associates to 430. Foreign associates are nonvoting members of the Academy, with citizenship outside the United States. The NAS is a private, non-profit society of distinguished scholars engaged in scientific and engineering research, dedicated to the furtherance of science and technology and to their use for the public good. It was established in 1863 by an Act of Congress signed by President Abraham Lincoln at the height of the Civil War that calls upon the NAS to provide independent advice to the government on matters related to science and technology.

For the complete list of new members, please consult the NAS press release.

In a display of bilateral engagement on Capitol Hill in Washington, French policymakers and members of the Congressional French Caucus [1] convened two roundtable discussions on February 7 to trade best practices in nuclear waste management.

The sessions brought together the Ambassador of France to the United States, François Delattre, and Marie-Claude Dupuis, CEO of the French National Radioactive Waste Management Agency (ANDRA). Organized by the French Caucus, the talks included the Caucus's Senate co-chairs, Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Sen. John Boozman (R-AR), as well as Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE). The roundtable in the House of Representatives included the participation of House Caucus co-chairs, Rep. Russ Carnahan (D-MO) and Rep. Michael Michaud (D-ME). In addition to several of the French Caucus's 106 members, Congressional staff, Congressional Research Service, reporters and professionals from related industries also participated.

Read the Full article on the Embassy of France in the United State website

In December, French Scientific Attache in the Consulate of France in Atlanta, Jacqueline Signorini was invited to the groundbreaking ceremony launching construction of the Yerkes Dual-Function Facility, the Emory Institute for Drug Discovery and the Center for Innovative Genetics.

From left to right: President of Emory University Jim Wagner, French consulate's Scientific Attache, Jacqueline Signorini, British consulate's Scientific Attache, Kerry Norton, Yerkes National Primate Research Center Director Stuart Zola at the groundbreaking on Dec. 12.

On December 20, 2011, the French Prime Minister Francois Fillon awarded the label of 2012 national awareness cause to the collective of associations: Rassemblement "Ensemble pour l'autisme" organized by the "Collectif Autisme" that gathers more than 200 parent associations and 800 facility manager associations. This label allows nonprofit organizations, wishing to organize campaigns and fundraising, to get free broadcasts on the radio and public television. The associations' action plan includes the first parliamentary meeting on autism in the National Assembly on January 12, the World Day of Autism Awareness on April 2 and the autism Tour de France in September.

This label puts the spotlight on the main associations working in support of autism and encourages them to gather and work together. This recognition will finally give autism institutional and media visibility, thereby reaching the general public.

The awarding of this label is a continuation of the 2008-2010 plan for autism, which gathered 187 million euros ($ 239 million) and has already enabled:

the strengthening of scientific knowledge, practices and training of professionals;

the improvement of diagnosis and recognition of the needs of individuals;

the promotion and diversification of the health and medical-social and experimentation with new models of support.

By making autism the 2012 national awareness cause, the Prime Minister marks the commitment of France to continue strengthening the care of individuals with autism.

Autism affects about 600,000 people in France. It can take many forms, which is why we speak of "autism spectrum disorders" that include problems for communication, social relations and behavior and sometimes mental retardation. Hundreds of different genetic anomalies creating autism have already been identified.

The care of patients is, according to the National Consultative Ethics Committee, "inappropriate" in France. "A lack of training of health professionals leads to delayed diagnosis with serious consequences (children are diagnosed on average at 6-years-old instead of 2) and parents are still oriented to inadequate psychoanalytic treatments." Finally, nearly 80% of eligible children do not attend school despite the law of February 11, 2005 which guarantees normally access mainstream school for handicapped people.

In Atlanta, the Emory School of Medicine, the Yerkes National Primate Research Center and the Marcus Center study autism.

Begun in June 2006, this experiment between CEA-Leti, based in Grenoble, France, and the Kavli Nanoscience Institute at the California Institute of Technolgy (the famous Caltech) in Pasadena, California, made concrete progress in January of the following year by launching the Alliance for Nanosystems VLSI (Very-Large-Scale-Integration). Their objective is to accelerate the speed at which they bring nanometric-based measuring systems to the commercial market .

On December 6, 2011, nearly five years later, Analytical Pixels Technology (APIX), the first start-up to come from the Alliance's work, was officially created. Based on the concept of miniaturized chromatography, the current, first systems that APIX is working on should be on the market by 2013.

To learn more, please consult the Caltech press release and CEA press release. Additional resources available in French include articles from the Office of Science and Technology's Bulletin Electronique newsletter ("Première start-up née de l'alliance entre le CEA-Leti et Caltech" and "Des nano-détecteurs pour des mesures à la molécule près !").

This page, as every other english Wikipedia page, has been blackouted January 18, 2012.

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François Fressin, a French astronomer expatriated at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge (Massachusetts), is the first author of a study published in Nature on Tuesday, December 20th, announcing the discovery of two extrasolar planets of a comparable size to the Earth.

Those two objects belong to a five-planet system orbiting around Kepler-20, a star located at a distance slightly less than 1,000 light-years and very similar to our Sun, though a little bit less heavy, hot and luminous. Among those five objects, three are mini Neptunes and two are cousins of the Earth. Named Kepler-20e and Kepler-20f, they are very similar in size to our blue planet with respective radii of 87% and 103% of the Earth's.

“For the first time in the history of humanity , we can stand: “that is, we are able to detect an Earth-like planet around another star. It is even the first time that we pass the barrier of smaller than the Earth” summarizes François Fressin.

This 33-year-old Frenchman specializes in the research of small planets using the data that NASA's Kepler space observatory has sent back to Earth since 2009. This observatory orbiting around the Sun is constantly observing a catalog of stars located within and around the Cygnus constellation. Kepler's instrument is a photometer, which measures minor variations of light emission. Its main objective is to detect the very low drop of the luminosity due to the passage – the transit, as astronomers say – of a planet in front of its star. To give an order of magnitude, Kepler-20e and f cause a diminution of this luminosity of one millionth. That is small, but sufficient for specialists to be sure that something is going on, and even more when these “hollows” in the luminous flux happen at regularly spaced intervals.

Kepler Satellite

Jean-Baptiste Michel holds joint academic appointments at Harvard (FQEB Fellow) and Google (Visiting Faculty). His research focuses on using large volumes of data as tools to help better understand the world around us — from the way diseases progress in patients over years, to the way cultures change in human societies over centuries. With his colleague Erez Lieberman Aiden, Jean-Baptiste is a Founding Director of Harvard's Cultural Observatory, where their research team has pioneered the use of quantitative methods for the study of human culture, language and history. His research has been featured on the covers of Science and Nature, on the front pages of the New York Times and the Boston Globe, in The Economist, Wired and many other publications. The online tool he helped create — ngrams.googlelabs.com — has been used millions of times to browse cultural trends. Jean-Baptiste is an Engineer from the Ecole Polytechnique (Paris), and he holds an MS in Applied Mathematics and a PhD in Systems Biology from Harvard.

He has been listed by Forbes among the "30 Under 30" Rising Stars of Science. Date: December 19, 2011 (www.forbes.com).

The event took place over the course of two days: with an animation of scientific activities at the “Alliance Francaise” of Milwaukee on October 13th, 2011, followed by an intense program in Chicago, on October 14th at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University located in the heart of town.

The project was twofold:

creating with the participation of partners in Chicago, an event in the spirit of the “festival of science” accessible to all, with various formats and content;

and sparking an exchange of experiences and good practices in scientific mediation in order to establish a dialogue and develop a partnership framework for joint actions.

Ateliers expérimentaux

In practice, the event in Chicago was divided into two phases: the first phase was dedicated to the public and primarily to schools, with workshops, manipulations and exhibits, and the second phase was for those involved in scientific mediation (professionals, scientists and teachers) around a plenary session followed by a panel discussion to encourage dialogue.

Cross-fertilization

The experimental workshops proposed a dual approach: direct experiments and demonstrations from research laboratories and a more playful approach using everyday objects offered by the association the “Petits Débrouillards”, which were a big hit with the younger participants. The Cross fertilization for this first event was made possible during interactive features such as the organization of a duplex with a science village of Rennes for younger audiences and a live virtual tour from the control room of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) for the older participants.

The diversity of partners involved on both sides of the Atlantic - Northwestern University / Ecole Normale Superieure (ENS) Ulm, CEA / CERN and Fermilab, the University of Chicago, the Field Museum and the University of Paris VI, Poitiers University / National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the Illinois Institute of Technology was the key success of this event where several disciplines were represented: chemistry applied to environmental energy and nanotechnology, biology and ecology, science of the universe and meteorites…

Overall, no fewer than two hundred fifty students in American high schools and the French high school came and visited throughout the long morning, to discover the activities offered by the forty animators, engineers, PhD students and researchers.

Fruitful meeting

Ateliers expérimentaux

Remarkably, the event took place in a highly convivial atmosphere: the students were able to handle, test, talk to young researchers,and take away ideas for experiments. The opinions collected - a questionnaire sent to teachers, students and facilitators is in the works - the exchange was very successful.

With regard to the discussion session between the scientific mediation professionals, the introductory lecture was given by Pierre Lena (Academy of Sciences), who after making a tribute to Georges Charpak, developed the objectives and benefits of the program “Get to Work” a true reference in the field with fifteen years of existence.

The panel discussion, led by Dr. Gerald Niccolai (ENS Lyon / CNRS, ICAR Laboratory ) introduced the debate with officials from several renowned institutions from Chicago - Fermilab, Argonne National Laboratory, Northwestern University - based on the experiments developed, and impact studies that were carried out. The participation of a representative of the National Science Foundation gave useful insights on mobilized funding for calls for "international" projects and selection criteria.

The conference brought together some sixty participants, mostly Heads of "science outreach" or "scientific dissemination" from university laboratories and research centers, and also departments of education, and young PhD students and postdocs interested in getting involved in such initiatives.

The appropriation of knowledge in question

If the presentations raised matters relating to the pedagogy of the diffusion of science, including the importance of questioning in scientific reasoning and experimental approach, "Science is made of questions, not answers" the exchanges during the discussion brought up questions relative to the appropriation of knowledge by citizens and specifically by the teachers; knowing how to:
provide tools to understand basic scientific phenomena and current issues of scientific research,
facilitate partnerships with stakeholders in the scientific and technological community (laboratories, research organizations, businesses, museums, associations …).

The assessment of a multitude of organized actions in Chicago, unfortunately too often dispersed, highlighted the consequences of a lack of control at a more centralized level. The parties that were present agreed on the importance of developing joint and cross-disciplinary projects. It is at this level that a bilateral dynamic could become a vehicle for new coherence and visibility.

One of the challenges is to make the "scientific culture" more accessible in order to enhance equal opportunities. Indeed, a number of factors hinder research and development (R & D) in the United States, including the weak academic and theoretical educational training of students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM education) and the disaffection, as it is happening in France, of young people and especially those of minorities in scientific careers. The national and international surveys show a significant decline in the skills of young Americans. This is the reason for the strong interest of our American partners seeking durable and quality programs developed in France.

See also the announcement and program of the French American Science Festival in Chicago.

Translated from LatitudeFrance.org.

About the promotion of scientific and technical culture: The French Institute supports the development of exhibits in various formats for the support of operations performed by the French cultural network and French cooperation abroad, as part of the themes with strong political and economic stakes.

Founded in 1961, under President Charles de Gaulle, the Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES) is the government agency responsible for shaping and implementing France's space policy in Europe. Its task is to invent the space systems of the future, bring space technologies to maturity and guarantee France's independent access to space.

President Sarkozy was in Toulouse, November 22, to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of this establishment. See the video: 50-ans-du-cnes-discours-de-nicolas-sarkozy-depuis-le-cnes-a-toulouse
(in French, of course).

Stamp - CNES 50th anniversary

See also "French Space Research: Celebrating 50 Years" on the embassy of France in the United States website.