ELISABETH BUSSER
226 articles published in Tangente
NewsN°228Feb 14, 2026CNRS public consultation: how French people relate to mathematics
33,000 citizens took part in the CNRS's major nationwide consultation on mathematics. Discover what this landmark survey reveals about access to maths.
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History and CultureN°227Dec 16, 2025In memory of Michèle Audin
Michèle Audin, a mathematician at the University of Strasbourg who specialized in symplectic geometry (at the intersection of differential geometry and dynamical systems), died on November 14, 2025.
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History and CultureN°227Dec 16, 2025A very dear Pascaline
This past November 19, a Pascaline dating from 1642, valued at between two and three million euros, was due to go under the hammer at Christie’s in Paris.
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Math for everyoneN°95Aug 22, 2025Games for practising arithmetic
All right… a little screen time after all—not to do the arithmetic for us, but to practise mental arithmetic while having fun. The games featured on this page can be downloaded to a smartphone.
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History and CultureN°224Jun 11, 2025The 2025 Tangente Prize
Every year since it was created in 2009, the Tangente Prize has honored a book "that has inspired a wide readership to learn more about one or more areas of mathematics." The jury had to choose among six shortlisted books.
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History and CultureN°94May 12, 2025The great book of problems
The "Book" was a project of Erdős's to bring together the most beautiful known mathematical proofs, several of which had been found by Erdős himself. Although he died shortly before the project was completed, the work was nonetheless published, authored by Aigner and Ziegler. Its successive new editions keep the flame alive.
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History and CultureN°221Dec 17, 2024Mathematics for citizenship
Condorcet embraced the ideals of the French Revolution and played an active part in the educational reforms set in motion by the Revolution.
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Math for everyoneN°92Dec 03, 2024Heptadecagon: fact and fiction
Theory tells us that a regular seventeen-sided polygon—a heptadecagon—can be constructed using only a straightedge and compass. But it gives no details of the construction, which is far from straightforward.
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History and CultureN°220Oct 16, 2024Thales’ children
Many proofs in elementary geometry rely on proportionality. Almost all of geometry’s classic theorems involve it: Thales, Ptolemy, Menelaus, Ceva, Pappus… Here is a brief tour of these great problems.
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History and CultureN°220Oct 15, 2024Death of Pierre Cartier (1932–2024)
Nicolas Bourbaki himself announced it in "Le Carnet" in the September 1–2 issue of Le Monde: the group "pays tribute to Pierre Cartier, who died on August 17 and was a contributor to and voice of the group for many years. A wide-ranging, voluble and mischievous mathematician (he announced Bourbaki's death forty years ago), he leaves behind a rich and varied legacy."
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History and CultureN°218Jun 13, 2024Geometry's free spirit
In the centenary year of his birth, we look back at the life of Benoît Mandelbrot, the "father of fractals": those strange geometric entities with which he adorned mathematics and which he managed to uncover even in nature.
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History and CultureN°90May 07, 2024The first irrational numbers
The square root of 2 and the golden ratio are algebraic numbers that are relatively easy to define. Yet they have gone down in history as the first known irrational numbers, with perhaps, in the latter's case, a touch of the "divine."
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