Podcast Categories: Science & Medicine

Senior member of the University Institute of France, Chair of Mineralogy at the University Pierre & Marie Curie in Paris.

Born in 1948, Georges Calas graduated from École normale supérieure de Saint-Cloud-Lyon and received a Doctorat d’État in Mineralogy from the University of Paris (1980). He obtained a CNRS research position in 1972, and was invited researcher at the Clarendon Laboratory (Oxford) and the Grant Institute of Earth Sciences (Edinburgh). He also volunteered for technical cooperation in Mexico (1974-1975). He was appointed full professor at the University Paris Diderot-Paris VII in 1981, where he was head of the Department of Earth Sciences. Member of the Scientific council of the University Paris VII and of the Board of directors of the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, he was deputy-director of the Laboratory of Mineralogy-Crystallography /Institute of Mineralogy, Physics of materials and Cosmochemistry. He is external reader at École normale supérieure since 1986, and has been Allan V. Cox Visiting Professor at Stanford in 1992. He was appointed in 2001 at the University Pierre & Marie Curie, where he is a member of the expert committee of the Quadrivium 1 Seed Fund. He is a senior member of the University Institute of France since 2006.

Bohmian mechanics, also ofter referred to as the de Broglie-Bohm theory, is a theory of quantum phenomena based on a particle picture. It provides an ontologically clear and mathematically precise framework from which the entire quantum formalism can be deduced. This series covers some of the most frequently asked questions about Bohmian mechanics. It also addresses widespread criticism, misconceptions and confusions in a concise way. For further details we refer to our introductory lecture on Bohmian mechanics, also available on iTunes U.

Darwin’s Library is a special digital reconstruction of the working library of Charles Darwin, drawn from Darwin’s own copies held at Cambridge University Library. Our iTunes U selection includes some of the most significant and highly annotated books on Darwin’s shelves, all digitized from the originals at Cambridge. The Darwin’s Library project was funded by the JISC and the National Endowment for the Humanities, worked on in collaboration with the Darwin Manuscripts Project at the American Museum of Natural History, and undertaken with the permission of the Darwin estate. The materials made available through iTunes U are available for non-commercial use.