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Very often in nature, we observe phenomena of natural synchronisation and the emergence of regular patterns: a crowd applauding in unison at the end of a concert, the cells in the walls of the heart pulsating in a coordinated fashion, black and white stripes on a zebra, brown spots surrounded by black in leopards... But how can we explain this uniformity if there is no global controller or explicit rule directing this coordination?

BepiColombo will fly past Mercury on 19 June 2023. It will pass close to the planet's surface at an altitude of approximately 236 km. BepiColombo is an ESA/JAXA mission involving a team of researchers from the University of Namur (naXys institute).

The European Euclid satellite will be launched into space from Cape Canaveral in the United States at 5.11pm on Saturday 1 July. The telescope is intended to provide a more accurate map of billions of galaxies over a distance of around twelve billion light years. A team of Belgian scientists and engineers from UCLouvain, ULB, ULg, UNamur and Ghent University, as well as the Space center in Liège (CSL), took part in this ten-year project, bringing together more than 3,500 people from 21 countries.

Modelling the Universe to understand how it came into being, how it works and how the physical objects that make it up work - that's the day-to-day work of the researchers in the naXys SPACE cluster. It's a subject that fascinates not only scientists. An international conference on "Complex Planetary Systems (CPSII)" is being organised at UNamur from 3 to 7 July 2023, with activities open to the public, including two round tables, a show at the Delta and a Space Quiz!

On June 9, 2024, Belgians will be called to the polls to elect their European, federal and regional representatives. With its Department of Political, Social and Communication Sciences, and the research carried out within the Transitions Institute, UNamur is sharing its expertise to inform and raise awareness among students, the general public and also professionals in the political and legal sector, about the major issues at stake in this election! Today, Arthur Borriello, Professor of Political Science at UNamur, discusses the rise of the extreme right. Our aim? In five questions, to understand the causes and mechanisms, and to show the importance of the citizen's role in the fight against the extreme right.

The workshop provides a forum for the discussion of new research directions and applications in Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and in related fields, where different disciplines and research areas could effectively meet. It was first held in 2007 in Sampieri (Ragusa), as the incorporation of two separate workshops (WIVA and GSICE).

At the beginning of each academic year, the Board of Trustees grants Namur Research College (NARC) Fellowship status to researchers who demonstrate a high level of research achievement and who have recently received a prestigious award or funding. A look back at the fellowship of Professor Frederik De Laender.

Networks are fundamental to the modelling of complex systems, systems composed of an incredibly large number of interacting parts. Applications are numerous, in neuroscience, epidemiology, but also in computer science and engineering. A collaboration between the University of Catania (Italy) and the University of Namur, led by Professor Timoteo Carletti of the Department of Mathematics (naXys Institute), has developed a new formalism that allows the modelling of systems where several parts interact at the same time (multi-body) and in an asymmetric way. This research has been published in the prestigious journal Communication Physics, part of the Nature group.

The design and analysis of the individual and collective behaviour of small biological vermiform robots: this is the objective of BABots, an ambitious interdisciplinary research project led by the University of Namur and conducted by a consortium of seven European partners. This project could lead to multiple and promising solutions in the field of agriculture, bio-industry or even industry and medicine.

The Democratic Transformations Cluster studies how political systems are evolving in response to major contemporary shifts — from the structural fractures emerging out of capitalist crises to the upheavals of the Anthropocene and the technological revolutions transforming communication.Its research addresses crucial questions such as climate governance, the evolution of party politics, minority representation, new forms of protest, political personalization, and new modes of citizen participation. These themes also invite reflection on the philosophical foundations of modern democracies.

The Territorial and Socio-Environmental Transformation cluster brings together researchers who seek to understand and support—even stimulate—the transformations that human societies must undertake in the face of major contemporary challenges.

The transformation of our societies is affecting the construction of our lives and life courses. These are traversed by a dual movement of de-standardization and de-institutionalization, leading to a gradual detachment from social roles, but also to a rise in social, cultural and gender uncertainties and inequalities. The "Transitions and Ages of Life" cluster studies the way in which these life courses are recomposed according to new social constraints and normative imperatives. It thus focuses on the fragility of populations at any age of life, and also on the repercussions of political devices and measures on the construction of life courses.This cluster brings together researchers from different disciplinary backgrounds who analyze both the normative transformations affecting life courses and life-age transitions..