Science at the heart of Paris

Five years ago Angela Barr took a ferry to France (there was no Eurostar then) and made her way to the School of Physics and Chemistry in the Latin quarter of Paris. She had come to study physics for a year as part of her degree at Imperial College. Sarah Tomlin talks to her about life in the most romantic city in the world.

Angela, what was your first day in a French lab like?

Well I was very nervous, because at the time my French was pretty basic, I could just about ask for directions to the Metro! When I arrived the school was in absolute chaos because the Nobel Prizes had just been announced and Georges Charpak who worked in the General Electricity lab had received the prize for physics. There were TV cameras and journalists everywhere. However, despite all the excitement, Professor Jacques Lewiner, who is head of the General Electricity lab, managed to find time to welcome me to his lab and to France in a perfect Frenchman’s English. It was such a relief to find a friendly face, I felt immediately at ease. The first two weeks in a new place are always the hardest and it was the first time someone had actually welcomed me to the country.

But your French did improve?

In the beginning hand signals and facial gestures were essential and I soon got in the habit of saying, "oui, d’accord" to everything I didn’t understand, even when somebody asked me the time! But being immersed in a totally French environment, it doesn’t take long before you start picking it up. Everyone in lab was very patient and kind and put up with my "charming" accent. We all had coffee together everyday after lunch where we would discuss anything and everything. And there was always a "pot" in the lab, celebration drinks for someone finishing their thesis, or for any reason at all! So there were plenty of opportunities for me to practise my French and a glass of wine does wonders for your confidence in the beginning.

What were your first impressions of George Charpak?

I suppose I was initially very much in awe of him. After all he was a Nobel Prize winner who can speak five languages fluently (including Chinese) and here was I, a mere exchange student from London who was struggling to communicate in French. So, I was extremely touched when on my 21st birthday he wrote me a letter which said, "Savour your 21 years and remember to always associate enthusiasm and research, friendship and competition." Now that I am working directly with him I have got to know him a lot better. He’s extremely down to earth and very approachable, and he’s always especially charming towards women.

What work did you do in the lab during your year there?

During my first year in the lab I was involved in the confidential design of an electronic flame detector which was eventually sold to Air France for use in their aeroplanes. So my first experience of research was extremely positive.

What was it like living in Paris?

Like most people I fell in love with Paris - its elegant buildings, its long boulevards and even its hassled Parisians. Having an appetite for good food, the French way of life suited me well and all that French flair added a bit of "je ne sais quoi" to my relatively uncultured life.

And how did you like French men?

I came over to Paris on that first year with visions of being wined and dined by all those supposedly romantic French men and sailing up and down the Seine with them on a Bateau Mouche...it didn’t exactly work out that way!!!

What advice would you give someone who was thinking of studying abroad?

Allez-y. Seize the opportunity. The experience opens up a whole new sphere of opportunity to you. I left Paris after my first year with the ability to communicate competently in another language, a cultural education and numerous lifelong friends and contacts.

Why did you decide to go back to study in Paris after you graduated from Imperial College?

I found it very hard to leave Paris at the end of the year and so I made a promise to myself before leaving that I would be back. I looked into the possibilties of doing post-graduate work there and found that with the contacts I had made there would be no problem.

What is a D.E.A. and what did you have to do to get one?

D.E.A. stands for Diplome d’Etudes Approfondis. It is basically the equivalent to a Masters and in France it is neccessary to do a D.E.A. before being accepted for a PhD. You have to spend a year following lectures and carrying out a research project in a laboratory. I was able to go back to the lab I had worked in before and do a project with the same group.

How did you end up working in Charpak’s lab?

By chance really, luck of the Irish I suppose. During my D.E.A. I happened to be chatting to an English visitor to the lab, Joe Dickinson, about my interest in medical physics. Unbeknown to me he had recently approached Charpak with an idea for nuclear medicine, and shortly afterwards I was asked to join the project team as a PhD student.

So, tell us about the heart imager project?

We are in the process of designing a medical camera to better diagnose heart disease. The design is based on Charpak’s prize winning multiwire detector which has revolutionised the imaging of subatomic particles at CERN. When a patient has heart problems, the heart can be studied by injecting a radioactive isotope into their bloodstream which irradiates the whole body for several days. The advantage of using the very sensitive multiwire chamber is that we can use a radioactive substance with a lifetime of minutes. This reduces the radiation dose by a factor of ten which is especially important in the case of children. The project is a European collaboration with teams from Italy, France and England.

What is it like working with a Nobel Prize winner?

Working with a Nobel prize winner has certain advantages. At a champagne reception held shortly after Charpak won the Nobel Prize I had the chance to rub shoulders with the likes of the Mayor of Paris, Jacques Chirac, now the President of France. Since then Charpak has become quite a personality in France and makes frequent appearances on TV and radio. I even managed to get two minutes worth of fame myself in a documentary film about his work a few months ago. Charpak has recently written a book defending nuclear science which has provoked many televised debates with French ecologists. He is astonished that we are still petrified, ten years after the event, by the radiation clouds that came from Chernobyl but we are indifferent to the dangerous doses of radiation given to children in French hospitals every day.

How do you like CERN?

Living in Geneva is wonderful because of its surroundings. From my office I have a view of Mont Blanc. Ski resorts are only an hour’s drive away so my weekends are now taken up trying to master the pistes. With CERN being situated on the border I am in an interesting position where my office is in France and my lab is in Switzerland and I have to use my passport to get from one to the other!

So what’s your next move? Are you off to Italy next? Or is it back to Paris or even home to Northern Ireland?

As there is a collaboration with an Italian team on the project I have the opportunity to carry out some research in Padova near Venice, so Italian will probably be the next language I have to learn.

Looking back to that first day in Paris five years ago, did you ever imagine you would end up working with a French Nobel Prize winner?

No I suppose I have been very lucky and couldn’t ask for any more career wise. Back then I didn’t think Nobel prize winners were people you socialised with. Now I know two! Carlo Rubbia the famous Italian Physicist who won the Nobel Prize in 1985 has his office near mine. A few weeks ago my car broke down in the car park and he offered to help push it...which was quite ‘noble’ of him! Mind you he stopped short of looking under the bonnet…I suppose the origin of the big bang is more interesting than the origin of the problems in my big banger!

Where do you see yourself in five years time?

I would like to see the cardiac imager project right through to the bitter end. Hopefully it will be a means for me to enter the world of nuclear medicine in which I have become very interested. Whether that will be in Paris, London, Geneva or even Belfast only time will tell.