The ocean covers more than 70% of our planet. But what we may imagine less is that it is home to the majority of living species on Earth. It also generates 60% of the ecosystem services essential to life. It thus produces most of our oxygen. And also absorbs 30% of our greenhouse gas emissions and more than 90% of the heat generated by our activities. With global warming, unfortunately, this beautiful mechanism is seizing up.

The United Nations has declared the decade that is beginning the “Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development ”. And to help younger generations take up this major challenge, the Dassault Systèmes Foundation, supported by partners who are experts in the matter, has developed an innovative digital educational course: Mission Océan.

The program is aimed at secondary school students and middle and high school students. Beyond simply making them aware of the major issues of the ocean, the ambition is to show them that they have the power to act on their environment. While helping them to deepen their knowledge in mathematics, physics-chemistry, earth science, etc. And why not thus, to arouse vocations.

Three new educational content

For the president of the Dassault Systèmes Foundation, Thibault de Tersant, “experience is the best way to learn, which is why Mission Océan relies on 3D and virtual universes ”. The mission counts in fact to involve the pupils in “digital twins” which make it possible to test hypotheses, find solutions and thus improve reality. They also make it possible to visualize, even to “move” in inaccessible places. And facilitate, by their playful side, the learning process.

On the occasion of this World Oceans Day, three new educational content are offered to middle school students. The first invites them to discover the principle of biomimicry with the example of Torquigener albomaculosus. This small tropical fish is known to create circular nests in the sand and thus protect its eggs from sea currents. A technique that engineers are trying to copy to design protective structures.

The second new content addresses the same theme of biomimicry, from a different angle: that of marine energy production. With the exploration of a tidal turbine project which reproduces the undulatory movement of the caudal fin of certain marine mammals to produce electricity. The third and last new content offered to middle school students offers them a wonderful 3D dive around the wreckage of the Moon to learn how to find their way in space. And live a bit of the life of Louis XIV‘s sailors.