First physics with ALICE: from p-p to heavy ions

The ALICE experiment has been designed to measure the proper ties of strongly interacting matter created in heavy-ion collisions at LHC. The apparatus has se veral features, such as low p T accep- tance and powerful tracking over a broad momentum range, tha t make ALICE also an important contributor to the proton-proton LHC physics. In this respe ct it aims both at setting the baseline for the understanding of the heavy-ion data and exploring th e new energy domain. After an in- troductory description of the status of the experiment, thi s paper deals with the ALICE physics potential in particular discussing the early p-p and Pb-Pb r unning scenarios and the corresponding physics programmes