A l'UM la science [S02-ep04]: From toads to the 3D pro platform

This week on A l'UM la science, CEFE researcher Aurélien Besnard talks about the strategy adopted by a toad, the yellow-bellied sounder, to cope with the deterioration of its habitat by human activities. In the second half of the program, we take you on a tour of the Pro 3D platform at the Montpellier Mechanics and Civil Engineering Laboratory. Finally, we return to Amrin's chronicle, who tells us about La Télescope.

Last night I had a wonderful dream. I was a princess, living alone at the top of the tallest tower of my gigantic castle, when suddenly a Prince Charming arrived, whisked me away in his 200-horsepower white audi, crit'air 6 sticker, disgusting the whole countryside in the process, before trying to kiss me - without my consent, of course - and then bang! As if by magic, he turned into a magnificent toad, returned to his pond where he married a pretty toad. They lived happily ever after, and had many toad children, who in turn had many toad children, which soon repopulated the pond, then all the ponds in the region, then all the ponds in France and Navarre, and finally in Europe, and so on, until toads disappeared completely from the endangered species list.

And then I woke up, grabbed my computer to run 2 or 3 little searches and found that, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature in France (IUCN), out of 35 amphibian species, 8 are in danger of extinction due, as you'd expect, to human activity and its impacts. These include the Brown Pelobate, also known as the Knife Toad, the Field Frog, the Lanza Salamander and the Yellow-bellied Sounder.

In fact, this is the species chosen for an unprecedented 25-year study carried out by 62 scientists from 7 European countries to assess the evolution of these populations. And what they have to say isn't entirely negative. Aurélien Besnard is our guest. He is a researcher at CEFE, the Center for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology. He took part in the study entitled " Compensatory recruitment ensures the viability of amphibian populations in anthropized environments ". An article published in the journal PNAS last September.

In the second half of the program, we'll be visiting the Pro 3D platform at Montpellier's Mechanics and Civil Engineering Laboratory, in the company of Yvan Duhamel, who will be presenting this additive manufacturing platform - in other words, three-dimensional printing - where he supports researchers and students wishing to manufacture unique plastic or metal parts for their research projects.

At the end of the show, Amrin will tell us about La Télescope, a start-up specializing in light pollution prevention.

At UM la science you've got the program, here we go!

Coproduction : Divergence FM / Université de Montpellier
Animation : Lucie Lecherbonnier
Interview : Aline Périault / Lucie Lecherbonnier
Reportage : Aline Périault
Editing : Bruno Bertrand
Production : Adeline Floc'h

Listen to the program "A l'UM la science" on Divergence FM 93.9