Travel to the era of dinosaurs or Gallo-Roman amphitheaters, understand the mechanisms of water and ice, fly as close as possible to the Sun and Saturn or even discover physics thanks to Marie Curie, CNRS le Journal offers you a selection of beautiful books devoted to science, to offer without moderation.
Bringing Antiquity back to life
This richly documented and illustrated work will take you on a journey to discover spectacular and sometimes little-known Gallo-Roman sites. Thus, 74 places were listed and classified in chapters corresponding to the provinces of Roman Gaul. Through the nearly 140 watercolors created by Jean-Claude Golvin, specialist in the restitution through images of the great sites of Antiquity, and the texts of the archaeologist and historian Gérard Coulon, readers will walk through the streets of the cities from Narbonne and Lyon, will visit the aqueducts of Moselle, the sanctuaries of Côtes-d'Armor, or contemplate the grandiose amphitheaters which dotted the territory during Antiquity.
Peregrination in Roman Gaul. And in the provinces of the Alps and Corsica, Gérard Coulon and Jean-Claude Golvin, Actes Sud, October 2024, 224 p., €34.
Explore Saturn
Third volume of the “Solar System” collection from the publishing house Glénat, this comic strip takes us to the rings of the gas giant Saturn. After passing through Mars and Jupiter, the group of scientists is now exploring the second largest planet in our Solar System, and is still asking as many questions about the formation of planets, their composition and even the reason or origin of this or that moon. A must-read if you want to know more about what's happening beyond Earth.
Saturn. The keeper of the rings, Bruno Lecigne and Federico Dallocchio, Glénat, October 2024, 64 pp., €15.50.
Sailing the seas
Did you know that the Vikings reached the shores of America 500 years before Christopher Columbus? That we now consume more fish produced by aquaculture than from fishing? That the majority of drinking water in Israel comes from seawater desalination? The 1is Next January will mark the start of the Year of the Sea. The opportunity to (re)highlight this superb work released at the end of 2023, made up entirely of infographics. Detailing the history of the conquest of the seas through human wanderings, their exploitation and even their contributions to the field of medicine, this collection also gives pride of place to contemporary issues inseparable from the oceans. For those curious about these bodies of water and what is hidden there.
The sea. An infographicCyrille P. Coutansais and Guillemette Crozet, CNRS Éditions, Coll. “Homo Graphicus”, November 2023, 108 p., €25.
Learn with Marie Curie
From a notebook of a former student of the school “cooperative” dedicated to science education for children, created by Marie Curie at the beginning of the 20th centurye century, these 40 experiments will immerse young and old at the heart of the legacy of this great scientist, the first woman to receive a Nobel Prize. Whether you are a teacher, parent or simply curious about science, these easily doable experiments will help you understand essential concepts of physics, such as density or pressure.
40 elementary physics experiments from Marie Curie's lessons, Eric Bernard, Hervé Arribart, David Jasmin, EDP Sciences, September 2024, 123 pp, €22.
Dreaming with dinosaurs
The dinosaurs of the saga Jurassic Park are they realistic? In what way does the saga renew the image of the “terrible lizards”? Or how does it question the impact and uses of science? So many literary, cinematic and scientific themes that are addressed, more than thirty years after Michael Crichton's novel and Steven Spielberg's first film, the essay Jurassic Park and science. Richly illustrated by Alain Bénéteau (watercolors, sketches, paintings), this work will delight newbies and fans of the saga alike.
Jurassic Park and science, Jean-Sébastien Steyer and Nicolas Allard (dir.), Belin, October 2024, 256 p., €28.
Understanding glaciers
We thought they were eternal and yet… they are melting. Present on all continents, glaciers fracture, drift and disappear as global warming increases. Through a hundred maps and infographics, this very complete atlas on these 274,000 “seas” of ice gives us access to a wealth of data ranging from their location to their formation, without forgetting the close links that bind humans to these immaculate expanses.
Glacier AtlasDenis Mercier and Gaëlle Sutton (cartographer), Editions Autre, September 2024, 96 p., €24.
Decipher contemporary Art
Did you know that without oil, there would probably be no contemporary art? or that there are art libraries in France where you can borrow works without buying them? Here is some of the information distilled, with the help of data visualization, in this book which will take you on a journey into a world where history, politics and the economic aspects inherent to contemporary art coexist. Whether you are a specialist or naive, this set of infographics will only whet your curiosity.
Contemporary Art. An infographicBéatrice Joyeux-Prunel and Guillemette Crozet, CNRS Éditions, Coll. “Homo Graphicus”, October 2024, 110 p., €26.
Examine the Sun
As large in size as in its interest, this atlas of the Sun details everything we know about our star. Cosmogony, weather, solar winds… nothing is left to chance in this book developed with the European Space Agency, CNRS researchers and astrophysicists from the Paris Observatory. Dotted with a multitude of infographics and breathtaking photos, the book immerses us in this star and retraces the great scientific discoveries that allow us to better understand it.
The Great Atlas of the Sun, Milan Maksimovic, foreword by Pierre Léna, Glénat, November 2024,176 p., 39.95 €.
Take inspiration from beavers
Concrete, corseted, drained, rivers no longer protect us from floods or droughts. It is time to rehabilitate the “beaver system”, as the philosopher Baptiste Morizot calls it. To form an alliance with this animal which, before being decimated, proved its ability to create real hydrological systems allowing in particular to increase the residence time of water in rivers and to restore it during the hottest periods of the year. Beautifully illustrated with watercolors by Suzanne Husky, this book navigates very simply between science and philosophy and invites action.
Return water to the earth. Alliances in rivers in the face of climate chaosBaptiste Morizot (texts) and Suzanne Husky (illustrations), Actes Sud, October 2024, 352 p., €28.
Make sense
In its latest issue, the CNRS review Science notebooks devotes its central file to the odyssey of the human species, from the separation with the lineage of the great apes to the appearance ofA wise man. You will be able to understand why birds do not fall while sleeping, follow the missions of researchers studying the ice floe, learn more about Edith Heard, epigenetics specialist and winner of the 2024 CNRS gold medal, or even find out if the Solar system is made up of nine planets… or not.
Science notebooks n°17, CNRS Éditions, to be published on December 5, 2024, 196 p., €14.
