Scientists embrace a cathedral’s rebirth
The day that Notre Dame burned, we here at Science News watched the live coverage of flames raging into the clear April sky. Like so many other people around the world, we were heartsick. It was hard to imagine that the beloved 850-year-old cathedral could survive such a massive conflagration. But Notre Dame somehow endured. And within days, scientists were springing into action, eager to offer their knowledge to ensure the cathedral’s revival. One of them was Brian Katz, a physicist living in Paris who had studied Notre Dame’s unique sound. When Science News physics writer Emily Conover learned about Katz’s work a few weeks after the fire, she knew that this was a story she wanted to tell. Conover called Katz, and learned that he had recorded Notre Dame’s acoustic properties in 2013 and had built a virtual reality evocation of the cathedral’s unique sound. With the fortuitous data...