Little Nocturnal Secrets

Project Information

LINCS

Grant agreement ID: 954509

DOI

10.3030/954509

Project closed

EC signature date 20 July 2020

Start date 1 May 2020

End date 28 February 2021

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Total cost

€ 674 180,00

EU contribution

€ 275 757,00

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITE MARIE ET LOUIS PASTEUR
France

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - LINCS (Little Nocturnal Secrets)

Reporting period: 2020-05-01 to 2021-02-28

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The ERN is an event allowing to create a direct link between researchers and the public. This is useful both for researchers and the public. Researchers are trained for this specific type of communication and confront their research subjects with the public. This encounter brings interesting questions, but also joy and motivation for researchers to keep on their work. This is especially important for young researchers that can sometimes feel isolated. The public gains knowledge about scientific subjects, but more importantly about research itself: how it is to work in a lab, how do researchers get funding for their works, how much does this and this cost... These questions about detail provide information about "real" research, and not only the image of it that exist in TV Shows, or in some parts of social media, very suspicious about research. With this information, people can make up their mind, change their views, to adjust to the testimonies and answers of the researchers in front of them.

With a lockdown situation, and an omnipresent scientific subject (COVID-19), organizing an event allowing to join a friendly and playful encounter to cheer up the minds, and strong scientific exchanges with the participation of researchers themselves is particularly important.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Organization of a fully online event in which participated 600 researchers and 80.000 visitors across all the French territory, but also across Europe and the world.
14 simultaneous events in different cities in metropolitan France and in La Réunion island.
More than 50 hours of live broadcast, in one evening, and 150 videos to watch during and after the event.
Presence on various social media (YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok), reaching a wide range of public.
Highlight of European research programs in all cities, in various activities (live show, videos, podcasts, zoom meetings...)

A very high satisfaction from the public, despite a general fatigue about online activities.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The success of the event shows that online activities can be highly interactive. Our speed searching online has been replicated by many organizations in France outside of the consortium, showing that our activities have been adopted by the professionals, the researchers, and the public.

visual identity for the ERN 2020