Literary meeting of Jean Audouze and Marie-Christine Maurel
for their work “From the cosmos to life”

Born in 1940 in Cahors, Jean Audouze is a world-renowned astrophysicist for having provided one of the fundamental proofs of the Big Bang model. Now an emeritus research director at the CNRS, he gratefully recounts his first steps in research, under the direction of Hubert Reeves at the end of the 60s. Propelled into the world of astrophysics somewhat by chance, he began by studying the hearts of stars. The Institute of Astrophysics of Paris will be his temple for life: from a doctoral student, he emerges as Director. An ascent subsequently spent probing what he calls the invisible: black holes, dark matter, or even dark energy, which populate the universe beyond our horizon.

The book by Jean Audouze and Marie-Christine Maurel is prefaced with humor by Erik Orsenna, who begins with these words: "When I think that I could have died an idiot..." Whatever our original scientific level, this work makes advance our knowledge and that after reading it, we are proud of what science is capable of discovering and transmitting.

The book transports us in an educational way from the Big Bang, through the creation of the Earth, to the appearance of Homo sapiens. The authors gradually remind us of the necessary knowledge in physics, biology, but also in the history of science, which allows us to understand the very good scientific level of the work. This would help limit the increasingly worrying ambient obscurantism plaguing the planet.

Free access.