News | Olivier Durif

A 3D printer in the lab

Tue, 18 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The big boss said OK: the laboratory is now equipped with a Bambu Lab X2D 3D printer (€850 with the multi-material AMS 2). Getting started is quick, dual nozzle, wide range of compatible materials.

There remains the production of the parts; I am not a big fan of CAD software with complex features and an interface that is often hard to get into, but I found a working environment I like, with AI: the PI agent, an MCP plugin for FreeCAD or Blender, and the GPT 5.6 Luna model, which turns a simple description of my parts in natural language, turned into a 3D model in a few iterations. The main drawback remains the slowness of the iterations, but the revolution is underway.

GPT excels at visual recognition — essential here — and Sol brings no decisive gain over Luna. The models I love for coding (GLM, Deepseek) are weaker at vision: multimodal GPT models are, in my opinion, the most performant on these tasks.

The essence of this approach now lies in the description: expressing a 3D part in words alone requires precise technical vocabulary. Wording a mechanical assembly unambiguously is actually more demanding than sketching a diagram on paper to share with a colleague.

Experience shows that the limits encountered do not come from the model itself, but from the agent’s understanding of the request. A simple practice improves results noticeably: before executing, ask the agent to confirm that the instructions are clear and to recap what it is about to do. Once agreement is reached, execution, although sometimes slow (including for small adjustments one might rather do in the GUI), generally proves remarkably reliable.

Just do it.

The Bambu Lab X2D 3D printer with AMS 2 in the lab

Adjustable camera holder, printed in blue, to visualize the Taylor cone of the electrospray

CPLT 2026 conference in Bochum

Thu, 06 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

From August 2 to 6, 2026, I attended the in Bochum (Germany), where I gave a 15-minute talk presenting my work on the reinterpretation of kinetic measurements performed in uniform supersonic flows.

Talk title: A Critical Reappraisal of Low-Temperature Kinetics in Uniform Supersonic Flows.

There, I show that rate coefficients of bimolecular reactions at low temperature have been overestimated: upon reactant injection, the mixing of gases comes with a density drop in the flow, which is mistakenly interpreted as a chemical decay. I predict that, for these systems, product-following measurements (which, unfortunately, struggle to materialize) will never recover such high values. After the considerable sums invested in new spectrometers dedicated to Laval nozzle expansions, it is time for the community to draw the methodological consequences.

As part of the conference excursion, we visited the German Mining Museum in Bochum. A fine reminder that science, like mining, is built in the bowels, in depth. My practice of science gives me the impression not of raising a building but of digging: descending toward the foundations, scratching, searching in the dark, hands in the mud. Chained to one’s project, scanning the cracks, the luminous openings in a confined space. A tribute to the courage of those miners, whose conditions were far harsher.

GDR EMIE plenary meeting in Toulouse

Mon, 08 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

In early June, I travelled to Toulouse for the plenary meeting of the GDR EMIE (the French network bringing together physicists and chemists working on molecular systems that are isolated or placed in a controlled environment). Being far from France, it is also a way for me to keep up with what is happening there and to exchange with the community, especially now that I am based in Germany. It was my first conference in this new postdoc.

I presented a poster on our work at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research: the ESIBD+SPM instrument we are developing for single-molecule imaging. The project is still in its early stages we are currently assembling the vacuum chambers and wiring the electronics in a room that was empty a few months ago. The project is ambitious, and progress is steady.

New postdoc at the Max Planck Institute

Sun, 15 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Starting March 15, 2026, I begin a new postdoc at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research (MPI-FKF, Stuttgart), in collaboration with .

My work focuses on the development of ESIBD instrumentation — soft landing of molecular ions from an electrospray — coupled with scanning probe microscopy (SPM) to image molecules one by one on surfaces under ultra-high vacuum.

Photo: Stuttgart Max Planck campus — .