iGEM Toulouse 2016

The 2016 Toulouse team is composed of students from INSA Toulouse and Paul Sabatier University, as well as several teachers from these two institutions. This diversity allows us to widen the set of skills and to bring a strong dynamic to complete the project.

The iGEM 2016 team is constituted of:
- 4 students from INSA Toulouse in 4th year of Biochemical Engineering: Anissa Dieudonné, Marine Dubois, Oumnia Karim and Fanny Leclerc.
- 4 students from Paul Sabatier University in 1st year of MABS Master: Manon Barthe and Camille Roux (specialized in Genetics / Microbiology), Eve Coutant (specialized in AgroBioSciences) and Soukaïna Timouma (specialized in Bioinformatics and Systems Biology).
- 3 teachers: Kaymeuang Cam (IPBS), Brice Enjalbert (LISBP) and Gilles Truan (LISBP). Kaymeuang Cam, researcher at the Institute of Pharmacology and Structural Biology (IPBS) is the Primary PI.

Students

Eve Coutant

Eve has a Masters degree in Agrosciences. She’s the quiet yet powerful strength of the team and exudes zen vibes. Never too short, her hair keeps disappearing as the weeks go by. Our only fear: she may end up bald by the time we land in Boston! In the lab, she started with cloning, followed with fungi, and is now in charge of ethics… Where will her next adventure take her?

Soukaïna Timouma

Soukaïna is the savior of the team. She’s the only one with a masters in Bioinformatics, so she’s in charge of the wiki, modeling and the device! In spite of it all, she still comes up with brilliant ideas like pipetting ice cubes, something we would never have thought of. Mom of the team, she also keeps or blood sugar high thanks to her weekly supply of candy!

Fanny Leclerc

Fanny studies Biochemistry engineering and is in charge of public relations. She is super connected: Facebook and Twitter are her best friends! She takes care of the team’s image et is our very personal paparazzi: she’s always ready to take pictures of us in every situation possible. Fanny is resourceful and has made it her life mission to take us to Boston the cheapest way possible and on time for the Giant Jamboree!

Marine Dubois

If tidying up was a subject at university, Marine would be head of her class: she’s a bit of a clean freak! (but we love her nevertheless). In reality though, Marine studies Biochemistry engineering. Without her, we would be beggars in the street, drowning in our despair. Treasurer and therefore pillar of the team, she has the difficult task of finding funds for our project. Think of her as a modern Scrooge!

Anissa Dieudonné

Anissa studies Biochemistry engineering and soon will be specialized in aquatic biology. She will be reunited with water, her favorite element! Rowing, the deep Corsican sea, and sushi are a few of her passions. She’s also the athlete of the team, and her bicycle is her best friend: she takes it everywhere! Her intense work outs keep her active until dawn. In the lab she’s the queen of gene design and knows all the sequences by heart!

Camille Roux

With a Masters in microbiology and genetics, Camille also applies for the title of queen of fungi, since she knows them best in the team. She’s very known for her punctuality (we’re still not sure if her watch is on time). You want to cook poached eggs in a mug? Ask Camille AKA the Mac Gyver of cooking: she hasn’t stopped impressing us during lunch hours with her special tricks!

Manon Barthe

Manon studies Genetics and Microbiology. She is a good advice giver, and takes care of all the clonings. She’s also a prankster: water battles, ice throws and upside down gel migrations are her specialty, and she never ceases to impress us. Her fuel: coffee. She hasn’t quite found the perfect recipe yet and we bet that by the end of the summer it won’t taste like gas anymore.

Oumnia Karim

With a master in biochemical engineering, Oumnia brings Morocco to us everyday! Little piece of sunshine, she dances, sings and lights us up with her smile! She will not get the "Queen of the lab" price but not doubt she will be rewarded for all her little mistakes (RIP the smelly medium)! ;)

Advisors and Instructors

Kaymeuang Cam

M. Kaymeuang Cam, university teacher in microbiology led this project wonderfully well. His advice and his availability were welcome for the team all over the year. Moreover, thanks to his quasi-weekly complement in sugar (donuts and doughnuts), we could be getting ready for Boston three months before leaving!

Brice Enjalbert

M. Brice Enjalbert, researcher in Biosystem and Process Engineering devoted a lot of his personal time helping and advising us in the project. We can remember every of his numerous schemas explaining some experiments and scientific aspects that helped us a lot.

Gilles Truan

M. Gilles Truan, researcher in molecular and metabolic engineering was indispensable during the brainstorming steps of the project. He helped us a lot thank to his incredible knowledge about the iGEM competition and synthetic biology.

Stéphanie Heux

Mrs. Stéphanie Heux, researcher in Agronomy, helped us a lot during meetings thanks to her creativity and her good mood. She was also very invested at the event "the night of researchers" for our stand and created a wonderful cell in polystyrene.

Pierre Reitzer

Mr. Pierre Reitzer, a former iGEM member, allowed us in brainstorming steps thanks to his experience in the competition.

Arthur Sarrade

Mr. Mathieu Fournie and Mr. Arthur Sarrade-Loucheur, PhD students helped us a lot with the experiments by giving us the first week, all the keys to succeed the cloning!

Thomas Lautier

Mr. Thomas Lautier, researcher in molecular and metabolic engineering, helped us a lot develop our ideas during the brainstorming session. A warm thank you goes to him for having organized "the night of researchers", the biggest event of sciences in Toulouse.

Mathieu Fournié

Mr. Mathieu Fournie and Mr. Arthur Sarrade-Loucheur, PhD students helped us a lot with the experiments by giving us the first week, all the keys to succeed the cloning!

Alexia Dumas

Mrs Alexia Dumas, PhD student was very present for the Human Practice. The theatre did not have secret for her anymore!

Let the show begin !!

Meet Ups !!

The European Experience

The Evry and Ionis teams organized on the 1st and 2nd of July, a huge meeting that gathered more than 11 European teams. In different rooms, each team had a space to hang its poster and set up flyers and communication supports. We explained our project and discussed with other iGEM members. Some helped us on different aspects like modeling and confinement of our bacteria. When we were not on our stand, we walked around the rooms and learnt more about other brilliant projects. We met a lot of nice people from different teams and we sympathized a lot with every French team.

The organizers arranged two lectures during the weekend. First it dealt with the challenges and the risks of synthetic biology and the second talked about a new economic world. Different people, like CEOs of company, trainees, young workers, or research scientists animated these round tables. One of our best memories was to meet the founder of iGEM: Randy Rettberg. It was an honor for us to speak with this person and to explain our project.

We thank very much the organizing teams for these amazing days in Paris! It was for us an enjoyable experience of what the Giant Jamboree will be in October.

Meeting with Itzel from TEC Monterrey team

One day, on our Facebook page, we received a message from Itzel Guzman, iGEM TEC Monterrey team member. She was in Toulouse for a semester and she asked us to meet us, the iGEM Toulouse team. We discussed a long time on our project over a drink and we sympathized a lot! We decided to collaborate together on the protocol videos (view more).