It is with great sadness that our scientific community has learned of the recent death of Professor Alain Junqua. Alain Junqua was an honorary member of the French Society of Biomechanics since 2010 and a professor at the University of Poitiers (France) where he built his brilliant career. Alain Junqua was a specialist in human movement analysis oriented towards gesture and sports performance. A great humanist with an immense scientific culture, he founded, in 1988, the CRITT Sport-Loisirs (Regional Center for Innovation and Technology Transfer) in Châtellerault (France). He then headed a research team at the CNRS, where he trained a brilliant generation of researchers specializing in biomechanics and sports science. He was also the initiator of the Jean Vivès, an award supported by the French National Olympic Academy and the EP&S editions and managed by the French Society of Biomechanics. Alain Junqua has often been dynamic within the SB as the blog article "Coubertin - Demenÿ : deux conceptions opposées du rôle du sport à l'école" (Coubertin - Demenÿ: two opposing conceptions of the role of sport in schools) that you will find on our website (link) still attests. In this respect, aware of the difficulties that teenagers may have in understanding scientific concepts and thus in accessing the scientific culture that has become essential in modern society, Alain Junqua has developed Olympic classes in science and sport. This device allows students, through the analysis of their own sports feat (long jump, vertical expansion, sprint race...) to apprehend the concepts of force, acceleration, speed and displacement. Thus, for Alain Junqua, the practice of sports had become a real medium for overcoming the reluctance that students have towards science. This action was one of his last commitments and is now developed by the CRITT and the RoBioss research team in Poitiers.
All the members of the Board of Directors of the Biomechanics Society, all the honorary members as well as the former presidents of our Society wanted to express their support to the relatives of Alain Junqua.
The Board of Directors of the Biomechanics Society
Within the framework of our partnership with the ANZSB, the members of the Société de Biomécanique have access to their lastest newsletter of May 2021.
The 17th International Symposium on Computer Methods in Biomechanics and Biomedical Engineering and the 5th Conference on Imaging and Visualization will be held from 7 to 9 september and will be fully on line.
This year there is again the possibility to organise a special session or workshop. Please find all important information HERE.