Daniel Beysens, CEA-Grenoble, Yves Garrabos, CNRS-Bordeaux
and Bernard Zappoli, CNES-Toulouse,
Winners of the "Gaz de France Grand Prix 2000," Awarded by the French Academy of Sciences

Paris, June 26, 2000

The French Academy of Sciences recently awarded its "Gaz de France Grand Prix" for the year 2000 to three scientists: Daniel Beysens (engineer at the matter science directorate of the Commissariat à l’énergie atomique [Atomic Energy Commission] in Grenoble), Yves Garrabos (CNRS research director at the "Institut de chimie de la matière condensée" [Institute for Condensed Matter Chemistry Research] in Bordeaux) and Bernard Zappoli (engineer at the Centre national d’études spatiales [National Space Research Center] and associate professor at Université Paul Sabatier in Toulouse). They received this award for "all their research on the behavior of supercritical fluids, in particular in the vicinity of the gas-liquid critical point. By combining micro-gravity experiments and modeling, they have made several outstanding discoveries, including a new heat transport mechanism referred to as the "piston effect." These discoveries constitute significant breakthroughs for extracting added value from supercritical fluids and for their industrial applications."

The prize awarded to these three researchers working at different research organizations recognizes their many years of collaboration. These experiments, which shed light on the "subtle" behavior of fluids in the critical and supercritical states, were conducted, in part, under micro-gravity conditions in the context of parabolic flights, on board the MIR space station, space shuttles, and probe rockets.
Daniel Beysens and Yves Garrabos have recently set up a joint CEA/CNRS team called "ESEME" ("Equipe du Supercritique pour l'Environnement, les Matériaux et l'Espace") [Supercritical Team for the Environment, Materials, and Space].
The three researchers will receive their prize from the French Academy of Sciences at the end of the year 2000.

Contacts:

CNRS
Carine Noël
Tel : +33 1 44 96 46 06
E-Maill : carine.noel@cnrs-dir.fr

CNES
Sandra Laly
Tel : +33 1 44 76 77 32
E-Maill : sandra.laly@cnes.fr

CEA
Karine Deffis
Tel : +33 1 40 56 14 88
E-Maill : karine.deffis@cea.fr