Drawing the invisible: comic book author meets physicists to talk about the representation of quantum physics in comics
The Swiss comic book festival BDFIL’s 17th edition took place in Lausanne between the 1st and the 14th May 2023. As the festival’s theme of this year is science in comics, NCCR SPIN collaborated with them to organize a public discussion between Laurent Schafer, author of comic books Quantix and Infinix (ed. Dunod) and NCCR SPIN scientists Prof. Anna Fontcuberta I Morral (EPFL) and Pierre Chevalier Kwon (University of Basel). The discussion was moderated by Marie Le Dantec.
First, the author and the two scientists introduced themselves in images, including what they do, what characters they identify with and what scientific discovery they would have liked to make. After our three protagonists debated on the place of comic books in scientific outreach and how science is displayed in the media, Laurent Schafer guided the public through the development of his stories and metaphors designed to ease the explanation of quantum principles to a larger audience. Taking several examples in his books, he told the public how he dealt with diverging scientific opinions and debated with our scientists about the representation of scientists in comic books. Our physicists briefly introduced quantum computers to the public, following the explanation in images of two quantum principles on which quantum computer are based: superposition and entanglement. In the end, Laurent Schafer gave the public a teaser of his next publication.
NCCR SPIN would like to warmly thank Laurent Schafer, Prof. Anna Fontcuberta i Morral and Pierre Chevalier Kwon for thoselively and very interesting exchanges, as well as all the team at the BDFIL Festival, especially director Gaëlle Kovaliv, for making this event possible! Teaser: another discussion with another quantum physics comic book author is planned in September… stay tuned!
Photos: from left to right, Prof. Anna Fontcuberta i Morral, Laurent Schafer, Marie Le Dantec and Pierre Chevalier Kwon (credits: Santhanu Ramanandan)