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Dr Fabrice Franck |
Fabrice Franck obtained a PhD degree in Sciences (University of Liège) in 1982 for his work on protochlorophyllide photoreduction, a light-dependent reaction in chlorophyll biosynthesis. He made several post-doc research stays in the 80’s, in particular in the Riken Institute (Japan) and in the University of Bielefeld (Germany). He is researcher of the Belgian Funds for Scientific Research (FRS-F.N.R.S.) since 1989. He published several papers in the 80’s and 90’s dealing with protochlorophyllide photoreduction and with the development of photosynthetic activities in relation to chlorophyll biosynthesis in higher plants. His present interest is focussed on the photosynthesis of microalgae and on mass cultivation of these unicellular organisms. He teaches Bioenergetics and Metabolism for master students in Biochemistry and Cell Biology at the University of Liège. |
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Dr Bart Ghysels |
Bart Ghysels obtained his PhD in science in 2005 at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, after presenting a doctoral thesis and publishing several papers dedicated to the study of iron uptake mechanisms of the gram-negative bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa. During a post-doctoral stay at the CEA research institute of Cadarache in France, he totally re-oriented the focus of his research to hydrogen photo-evolution by micro-algae. He joined the laboratory of bioenergetics of Dr Franck in april 2008. Although his present work involves the study of the flexibility of micro-algal photosynthesis in general, he always kept a special interest in aspects related to hydrogen photo-evolution. |
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Dr Thomas Gerards |
After he obtained a bachelor degree in Medical Biology and a master in Botany, Thomas gerards obtained his Ph D in palaeobotany-palaeoclimatology under the direction of Dr P. Gerrienne at the PPM laboratory (ULg). His doctoral research focused on the study of cretaceous fossils woods remains from the Mons basin in Belgium. In 2008, he joined the team of the Research Center of the Cyclotron (Ulg) as post-doctoral researcher in the context of the Eur-Intafar european project. This project was devoted to the discovery of new molecules inhibiting Penicillin-Binding Proteins from antibiotic-resistant bacteria. In 2009, he was hired at the laboratory of Bioenergetics (ULg) within the context of the BEMA project (Bio Energy out of Micro Algae). The aim of BEMA is to produce biodiesel and other high added-value compounds from microalgae. His current research focus on improving the productivity in biomass and lipids for several microalgal species by strain selection and optimization of culture methods ( photobioreactor, culture media, gas supply, carbon sources,…). |
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Anthony Fratamico |
Anthony started his Master thesis in the laboratory of Bioenergetics with the aim to optimize the culture of the micro-algae Haematococcus pluvialis. His work showed that this algae reacts in a complex manner to combinations of environmental conditions such as medium composition, light supply... After graduating with a Master in Biochemistry and Molecular and Cell Biology in 2010 (University of Liège), he started a PhD thesis with the support of a FRIA fellowship (the Belgian Funds for Research in Industry and Agriculture). His current research deals with the influence of the medium composition on the physiology of H. pluvialis. For this, he uses different techniques: Genetic Algorithm strategy to optimize experimental conditions, proteomics (2D-DIGE) to analyse metabolism, semi-quantitative RT-PCR, mutagenesis, chlorophyll fluorescence, oxymetry, HPLC, FACS... |
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Tung Le Thanh |
Tung obtain his master’s degree in “Morphology and taxonomy of some Dinophysis (Dinoflagellate) species in Vietnamese water” in Hanoi National University in Vietnam in 2008. He took part in PhD course in Laboratory of Bioenergetics since September 2014. His research is presently focused on the impact of dim light and different carbon sources on heterotrophic growth of various microalgal strains belonging to Chlorophyta phylum. |
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Dr Thomas de Marchin |
Thomas obtained his PhD in Biochemistry and molecular biology of the cell at the University of Liège in 2015. His research focused on the study of the flexibility of the photosynthetic apparatus of green microalgae and on the analysis of the functioning of photosynthesis in various growth conditions. Thomas is specialised in functional measurements of the photosynthetic apparatus with different methods like chlorophyll fluorescence (PAM and OJIP), spectrophotometry, oxygen evolution determination, HPLC and many others. He studied the impact of light, temperature and carbon dioxyde availability on productivities and photosynthesis of different algae strains cultivated in photobioreactor or in outdoor mass culture systems. |
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Dr Stéphanie Gérin |
Stéphanie obtained her Master degree in Biochemistry at the University of Liege in 2010 by performing a Master thesis in which she characterized the mitochondrial liver proteomic response to hypertriglyceridemia in a transgenic mouse model. Since then she has been occupying a PhD student position in the Laboratory of Bioenergetics thanks to an Aspirant doctoral grant from F.R.S.-FNRS. Her research mainly focuses on studying the dependence of bioenergetics and metabolism upon light, carbon and nitrogen availability in the model unicellular green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii by coupling experimental measurements (oxymetry, chlorophyll fluorescence, 2D-gel comparative proteomics,…) to multivariate statistics and large-scale modeling methods (design of experiments, MLS,…). Areas of interest: cell culture, bioenergetics, metabolism, proteomics, data analysis, biostatistics. Additional skills: authorized to direct animal experiments (FELASA Scientist training, category C). Stéphanie defended her thesis in December 2014. |
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Dr Francis Sluse |
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Dr Pierre Tocquin |