Communications

As has become tradition, this year the whole team was eager to find out what was planned for the team building exercise, and even more, to discover the identity of the mysterious TB team. Even if the revelation left some of us in shock, we weren't disappointed, as Capucine, Pauline, Laura, Bilal, Romain and Jeanne prepared a great murder party for us: Someone from the TB team killed Romain! So we were promoted to detectives to carry out a (more or less) in-depth investigation, uncovering hidden romances, shady business deals and, most importantly, the truth!

To celebrate this successful investigation, all the participants received a present from Secret Santa and we all enjoyed a well-deserved raclette.

After 3 years at URD ABI, Horiya Nassiba Ham successfully passed her final defense today!

Congratulations to Dr. Horiya Nassiba Ham!

Floriane Rischard successfully passed her final defense on November, 29th 2024. For the last 3 years, she has worked on her thesis between URD ABI and URCOM (Le Havre University).

Congratulations to Dr. Floriane Rischard!

Our scientists are serious, but they don't take themselves seriously!

From October 28th to 30th, 2024, the Process Engineering team from URD ABI proudly participated in the Green Extraction of Natural Products (GENP2024) conference held in Compiègne, France. Our participation was led by Morad Chadni, Cloé Dullier, and Christian Cravotto, who contributed with a presentation and a poster showcasing our innovative research on biomass valorization. This event provided an excellent platform to highlight URD ABI’s expertise in green and sustainable processes and to engage with global experts in natural product extraction.

We are delighted to have shared our work and exchanged ideas that contribute to advancing the field of sustainable development.

At the 10th IUPAC International Conference on Green Chemistry (ICGC), held from October 18-22, 2024, in Beijing, China, URD-ABI researcher Sami Fadlallah and PhD student Beatriz Chícharo delivered insightful oral presentations on their respective work in the synthesis of novel biomaterials through green chemistry methods.

This notable achievement highlights URD-ABI's commitment to cutting-edge research in eco-friendly innovations.

URD ABI was represented during the SFGP2024 congress, held on October, 15 to 17 in Deauville. This event was the occasion to meet our collegues working in process engineering and attend interesting conferences dealing with innovative works in this field.

Emilie Isidore presented a poster on the separation of lignin oligomers using membrane filtration. This work is part of the research project BIOPOLIOL, aiming to provide new polyhydroxyurethane polymers formulated with lignin oligomers. This project is funded by the French national research agency (ANR) and include 5 partners: IRCE (Lyon), ISA (Lyon), ICPEES (Strasbourg), Soprema (Strasbourg) and URD ABI.

The poster won the prize of "best poster of the category agro and bio-resources"!

From October, 7th to 10th, no less than 7 URD ABI's members participated at the 2024 edition of the CBSO symposium at beautiful Baie de Somme (France) with four talks by Horiya Ham, Boris Tran, Vivien Herrscher and Louis Mouterde, two posters by Jeanne Combes and Romain El Andaloussi, as well as a plenary lecture by Florent Allais.

A great way to promote our activities in biocatalysis and its use for the production of high-value added molecules and materials.

Florent Allais was invited to present our latest results on biobased and safe UV filters during the event organized by IMCD dedicated to the future of UV filters in the cosmetic industries.

It was a great opportunity to catch-up with colleagues and friends, but also to make new connections with future partners.

Thanks again to Laurent Blasco and Maud Chapis for their invitation!

On Monday, September 30th, Etienne Diemer, graduate student in chemical engineering, successfully defended his thesis at UTC (Compiègne, France). .

Etienne worked on the valorization of forced chicory roots under the co-supervision of Prof. Nabil Grimi (JRU TIMR, UTC-ESCOM) and Dr. Morad Chadin (URD ABI), in collaboration with APEF (Arras, France).

Congrats to our new Doctor!!!

On September 26, 2024, Kévin Magnien took part at the the Techday « Bioeconomy and Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients » organized by Bioeconomy for Change cluster, University of Reims Champagne Ardennes, University of Lorraine, Samabriva and URD ABI.

He had the opportunity to present our research works and our start-up hosting activity, Biotech’InnLab, as well as build new collaborations.

On August 31^st 2024, URD ABI took part to the Séquence Recherche et Innovation organized by Le Village de la Bioéconomie at the Foire de Châlons

Several talks, with an emphasis on scientific popularization, were given by Dr. Pauline Gerardin (Post-doctoral researcher), Bilal Loumi (Ph.D candidate) and Matthieu Mention (Engineer) to depict the many projects taking course at the URD ABI. Those communications were an opportunity to talk about the use of natural molecules as a sustainable alternative for the future through the collaborative project we have with the V.Biotech start-up, ant the ANR-funded Lagoon project.

Our director, Florent Allais, was invited to not one, but two Gordon Research Conferences this July! The first, devoted to Lignins, was held at Stonehill College, MA (USA) from July, 14 to 19. The second took place in Barcelona, Spain (July, 28 - August, 2) and was devoted to Green Chemistry. These two invited talks were an opportunity to present our numerous projects and innovations in the field of lignin and cellulose valorization.

Congratulations to Robin Fournier, the 3^rd student in the URD ABI - AgroParisTech/University of Florida co-tutored PhD program, who brilliantly defended his thesis on July 10^th!

On July 9, 2024, URD ABI was delighted to welcome a delegation from the Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech faculty (University of Liège, Belgium) and colleagues from various AgroParisTech sites.

This event at URD ABI marks a new stage in a fruitful cooperation, consolidating the academic and scientific links between AgroParisTech and Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech, and opening up new prospects for students and research in all our establishments' major fields: agronomy, biotechnologies, animal and plant sciences, forestry, etc.

This year, no fewer than 3 ABI representatives took part in the summer school dedicated to green chemistry, which has been held in Venice for several years now.

Beatriz Chicharo and Bilal Loumi, both graduate students in green chemistry, presented a poster on their respective research projects (e.g., biobased polymers and cellulose-derived UV-filters), while Florent Allais gave a lecture on how the combination of green chemistry, biotechnologies and downstream process, fosters innovation in biorefinery.

Many thanks to BioChem Europe, EFCG - European Fine Chemicals Group and EFG (Cefic sector groups), SICOS (chimie fine & biotech) and EuropaBio - the European Association for Bioindustries for having invitated our director to be part of this discussion panel at Achema.

A great opportunity to showcase our activities within the CEBB, as well as that of the Bazancourt-Pomacle biorefinery activities (research, innovation, transfer, demonstration plants, production...) carried out by both industrial (ARD, Givaudan Active Beauty, ADM, CRISTANOL, Cristal Union, Européenne de Biomasse).

On 13^th and 14^th June 2024, URD ABI was represented at NordBio II on biocatalysis and enzymes at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (Sweden). This event was organised to celebrate the 80^th birthday of Prof. Karl Hult.

A talk was given by Horiya Ham about the "Development of an enzymatic cascade for alkyl hydroxycinnamates synthesis". A first poster was presented by Boris Tran (ANR MilliStyrene) about "In vitro synthesis of bio-based 4-Vinylphenol by an enzymatic approach". A second one was presented by Vivien Herrscher (ANR SMALA) about a "New biocatalytic lactamization: Caprolactam production scale-up and exploration of industrial purification methodologies

ABI has celebrated the 25th anniversary of its partner URCOM laboratory by participating to the URCOM25 international conference, held on Le Havre (France) from 29th to 31st of May. A first talk was given by Robin Fournier about green synthesis of innovative levoglucosenone and p-hydroxycinnamate based molecules. A second one dealing with selective synthesis of stilbene derivatives (ANR project GlycoStil) was given by Dr. Amandine Flourat. This event also included a "Cosmetic Research Tour" event, as well as a tour of URCOM facilities.

On Thursday May 23, Amandine Flourat took part in the “Europe Day” organized by AgroParisTech's European and International Relations Office. The aim of the event was to inform the scientific community about funding opportunities for research and training.

Amandine took part in the round table to share her recent experience of setting up a European project as coordinator. The rest of the event was devoted to various workshops.