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Mentoring programmes
Biodiversity - Bioresources

Are you curious about science, particularly in biology?

  • What are the careers available in research, both in and outside the lab?

  • Which training programmes lead to these careers?

  • How does work in a laboratory actually happen?

  • How are scientific experiments conducted?

  • How are scientific findings communicated?

Would you like to:

  • Receive guidance to answer these questions (and more)?

  • Discuss your academic and professional goals

  • Explore careers and gain an insider’s view of how laboratories operate?

     

Mentors

  • Guide students in their scientific orientation and in identifying the skills needed for their career plans.

  • Provide support for students’ Master’s projects.

  • Share information about laboratory operations, institutional structures, and career development in the scientific field.

  • Invite students to observe ongoing experiments, participate in team meetings, and interact with laboratory staff (especially PhD students).

  • Make their research activities more accessible and visible.

Students

  • Regularly schedule meetings with their mentor.

  • Prepare for these meetings by defining specific questions about scientific orientation, career development, opportunities, and institutional operations.

  • Participate in team meetings when invited.

Steps to Follow:

  1. Identify a mentor based on the theme that interests you (https://graduate-plus.fr/biodiversite-bioressources/).

  2. Send an email to emmanuel.desouhant[at]univ-lyon1.fr to register no later than December 12, 2024.

  3. Groups will be formed (2 or 3 students per mentor) by the end of December 2024.

Mentorship: When? How? Who?

  • Timeline: Second semester (January–June 2025).

  • Format: 4 to 5 meetings/discussions, with opportunities to participate in team meetings and observe experiments.

  • Mentors: Researchers, professors, postdoctoral fellows, PhD students, engineers, and technicians.

Evaluation: no formal evaluation! This is an experience-sharing initiative designed to ensure everyone benefits as much as possible.

Mentors

Currently a postdoctoral researcher, I am investigating “How environmental conditions, particularly exposure to anthropogenic pollution such as light pollution, impact the health (immunity, microbiome) of animals in natural habitats.”

  • Keywords: Eco-immunology, microbiome, wildlife.

How do animals make decisions, and what are the consequences for their reproductive success? These are two of the questions driving my research on animal behaviour, focusing on two main themes: sexual selection (e.g., how and why do animals choose a mate?) and foraging behaviour (what, when, where, and how do they eat?).

  • Keywords: Mate choice, social environment, nocturnal light pollution, insects.

In the context of climate change, strengthening the resilience of French cities to extreme weather events has become a major priority. At the heart of this urban transition, greening initiatives represent a promising solution. My work focuses on the impact of new urban green developments on the proliferation of the tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus, a vector of emerging viral diseases in temperate regions.

  • Keywords: Nature-based solutions, Tiger mosquito, Human-modified environments, Public health

My research lies at the interface of evolutionary ecology and the management and conservation of animal biodiversity, particularly carnivorous mammals. Drawing on empirical field data, I aim to define effective conservation and management measures through a quantitative analysis of ecological processes, from individuals to populations. My approaches combine population genetics and genomics, demography, spatial ecology, and interspecific analyses.

  • Keywords: Evidence-based management and conservation, mammals, carnivores, field and laboratory work, quantitative ecology.

Understanding the dynamics that govern gene evolution — molecular phylogeny — is possible through the comparison of genomes between different species. For example, to understand the evolution of immune resistance to coronaviruses, we compare the genes involved in this resistance between primates or bats. This comparison is made possible by implementing molecular evolution models and computational data analysis methods, with the aim of extracting useful information for biologists.

  • Keywords: Bioinformatics, phylogeny, modeling, molecular evolution.

One of the questions driving my research is: “How do organisms control their genomic parasites: interactions between host, virus, and genomic parasites?” I use approaches from molecular biology, experimental infections, bioinformatics, and high-throughput sequencing.

  • Keywords: Evolutionary genomics, evolution of interactions, transposable elements, viral infections, RNA interference, drosophila.

Microbes are often in “cohabitation” within their host, raising many questions. For example: why are they more pathogenic or beneficial? How do they communicate (molecularly) with their host, or how do they persist? To address these questions, I use various approaches, such as life-history measurements, molecular biology, transcriptomics, or comparative metabolomics.

  • Keywords: Evolution, symbiosis, insects (bedbugs, drosophila, etc.)

  • Postdoctoral researcher

Currently in a postdoctoral position, my research focuses on the demography of natural populations, and more specifically on how global changes (climatic and/or anthropogenic) influence survival and reproduction in wild boar.

  • Keywords: capture–recapture, global change, demography, management and conservation, mammals

My research focuses on how anthropogenic factors (such as urbanisation, agriculture, climate change and biological invasions) shape biodiversity. The core of my work concerns the impacts of human-driven environmental change on species interactions, specifically genetic flow and interspecific competition. I work on various biological models (insects, reptiles, birds, mammals), with a particular interest in ants and their unique reproductive system.

  • Keywords: anthropisation; competition; behaviour; molecular ecology; gene flow; hybridisation; biological invasions; reproductive strategies

I am a research engineer on the CESN platform (Centre for the Study of Natural Substances) within the LEM, specialising in the analysis of metabolites involved in biotic and abiotic interactions. I use targeted and untargeted metabolomics approaches (UHPLC-QTOF, GC–MS, molecular networking) to study the symbiosis between nitrogen-fixing actinobacteria of the genus Frankia and their plant host Alnus. My work aims to decipher how these signalling metabolites orchestrate communication, the establishment of symbiosis, and stress responses.

  • Keywords: chemical ecology, symbiotic interactions, metabolomics

  • Researcher

  • guillaume.minard[at]univ-lyon1.fr

My research explores how micro-organisms influence the biology, ecology, and evolution of insects. My main study system is the Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus, an invasive species capable of transmitting more than 20 viruses to humans and animals. I investigate how symbionts and the microbiota are transmitted and how they modulate key traits such as reproduction, insecticide resistance, and the ability to transmit viruses (vector competence). By combining genomics, experimental ecology, and physiological analyses, I examine how these invisible interactions shape insect health and human disease risk.

  • Keywords: Microbial ecology, Global health, Symbiotic interactions

Currently in a postdoctoral position following a PhD in agricultural sciences, my research focuses on interactions between roots and beneficial bacteria. I study the ability of a Pseudomonas strain to colonise roots and differentially modulate the metabolome of numerous oilseed rape (Brassica napus) varieties, depending on their sensitivity to branched broomrape (Phelipanche ramosa), a parasitic plant that attacks roots.

  • Keywords: plant biology, microbiology, agronomy, metabolomics, PGPR, parasitism

I develop statistical tools and software to support the analysis of biological data. My work focuses particularly on community ecology (how and why biodiversity varies across space and time) and the analysis of ecological networks (which species interact and the processes underlying these interactions).

  • Keywords: statistical ecology; software; community ecology; spatial and multivariate statistics

I am interested in how soil microbes naturally help plants stay healthy. I study how these microbiomes protect crops from pathogenic fungi using genomics and microbial ecology. This research contributes to developing new, more sustainable plant-protection strategies that rely less on pesticides.

  • Keywords: microbiome; genomics; multi-omics; plant health; plant–microorganism interactions; agroecology

  • Lecturer-researchers

Our research aims to understand how bacteria communicate and interact with other organisms within ecosystems, including both phytobacteria living in the rhizosphere and phytopathogenic bacteria. We focus particularly on their extracellular vesicles—tiny lipid shuttles, roughly 100 nm in size, capable of transporting proteins, metabolites and nucleic acids (such as DNA) over long distances. These studies combine microscopy, multi-omics and genetic approaches to decipher the role of these vesicles in plant–bacteria interactions.

  • Keywords: extracellular vesicles; phytobacteria; plant–bacteria interactions; communication

My research focuses on the evolution and functionality of genomes. Thanks to new sequencing technologies, a wealth of functional genomics data is now available for many species and biological conditions. The comparative analysis of these data through species phylogeny allows for the identification of elements conserved over evolutionary time, thereby revealing genomic features preserved by natural selection, which are crucial for organisms. I carry out these analyses using bioinformatics and biostatistical methods that leverage large amounts of functional data.

  • Keywords: Evolutionary genomics, functional genomics, phylogeny, evolution.

Why do most enzymes have an efficiency lower than what would be physically possible? Why do some organisms excrete metabolites into their environment, which others use as an energy source? My work aims to provide plausible answers to these questions (and others!), by building theoretical models (mathematical, computational) based on well-described mechanisms.

  • Keywords: Theory / modeling in evolution.

My research focuses on the analysis of interactions in insects, using an evolutionary genetics approach. We primarily work on two biological models: parasitoid insects and bed bugs. For the first model, we investigate interactions with viruses, which sometimes affect the behavior of parasitoids, while other times contribute to enriching the parasitoid gene pool through horizontal gene transfers, occasionally leading to major genetic innovations. For the second model, we focus on the adaptation to humans and the insecticides they use to combat them.

  • Keywords: Genetics, genomics, evolution, symbiosis, viruses, insects.

Who are we? Who am I? These two intriguing questions perfectly define my research interests. I study symbiotic interactions, using the model of interactions between arthropods and bacteria, primarily transmitted vertically (from mother to offspring), in order to understand the factors that drive these interactions from intimacy to conflict or cooperation. The goal is to understand the dynamics of this chimeric individual and the consequences on the extended phenotype of the individual and the evolution of each partner.

  • Keywords: Symbiosis, insects, evolution.

My research focuses on the involvement of physiological mechanisms (particularly oxygen consumption, ATP production, and the production of free radicals (Reactive Oxygen Species: ROS)) in the organization of life history traits. The role of these physiological performances and their consequences are studied through internal variations (senescence) or external factors (mainly temperature changes). The biological models studied are primarily ectothermic vertebrates (Amphibians, Lepidosaurians, “Fish”).

  • Keywords: Ecophysiology, thermoregulation, oxidative stress, thermal stochasticity.

  • Postdoctoral researcher

Although the toxicity of many contaminants has been assessed in the laboratory, the implications of chronic exposure to low doses of multiple contaminants for wildlife remain largely unknown. My current research focuses on this issue, with a particular interest in the physiological and demographic consequences of toxic trace metals in roe deer.

  • Keywords: ecotoxicology, ecophysiology, trace metals, wildlife