The team

   Picture 2016

Thierry Durand studied chemistry at University of Paris VI, and then moved to Montpellier and received his PhD degree at University of Montpellier I in 1990. After a postdoctoral training at Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne, USA, with Joshua Rokach, he became Chargé de Recherche CNRS at the University of Montpellier I in 1991. He finished his Habilitation in 1996 and became Directeur de Recherche CNRS in 2002. He is a group leader at the Institute of Biomolécules Max Mousseron. His research interests include the total synthesis of oxygenated cyclic and non cyclic metabolites of polyunsaturated fatty acids, mainly leukotrienes, iso-, phyto- and neuroprostanes, as well as dihydroxylated PUFAs and more recently lipophenols and the understanding of the role of such bioactive lipids and lipophenols by developing collaborations with chemists, biochemists, biologists and clinicians over the word.

Laurence Balas studied chemistry at the University of Bordeaux and received her Ph.D. degree in 1992 from the University of Bordeaux under the direction of Prof. Joseph Vercauteren. After a postdoctoral fellowship on asymmetric radical chemistry under the supervision of Pr. Dennis P. Curran at the University of Pittsburg in 1993, she joined the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in Nancy. She moved to the Laboratory of Bioactive Lipids at Institute of Biomolecules Max Mousseron (IBMM) in Montpellier in 1997. She is currently involved in the total synthesis of non cyclic metabolites of PUFAs (leukotrienes, endocannabinoids, …) . 

Valérie Bultel-Poncé was born in Montpellier and received her undergraduate education at Montpellier University. She obtained her PhD in 1991 at Perpignan University and she did postdoctoral studies at Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris, in the field of natural products chemistry. At present she is an engineer at Montpellier University. Her research interests are in the areas of organic synthesis, medicinal chemistry, particularly on total synthesis of oxygenated derivatives obtained in vivo from non enzymatic peroxidation of PUFAs, like isoprostanes, neuroprostanes.

Céline Crauste was born in Montpellier (France) in 1982. She obtained her PhD in organic chemistry at the IBMM in the group of Pr. C. Perigaud in 2008. During her PhD, she worked under the supervision of Dr. S. Peyrottes, on the supported synthesis of nucleotides, based on soluble support, and she worked on the development of a new LC/MS/MS methodology to access intracellular concentrations of triphosphate derivatives in biological samples, under the supervision of Dr. I. Lefebvre. She did a first post-doctoral work at the Katholieke Universiteit of Leuven, in Belgium in 2009 with Pr. Piet Herdewijn in the field of total asymmetrical synthesis of lipo-peptides, used as new antibiotics. In 2010-2011, during her second post-doctoral fellow in the laboratory of Pr. B. Deprez (pharmaceutical university of Lille, France) she developed a new surface plasmon resonance (SPR) assay to study ligand/protein interactions in the field of new antituberculosis treatment with Pr. Nicolas Willand and Dr. Alain Baulard. Since 2012, and after a first ATER position in the team “Synthesis of Bioactive Lipids” (IBMM), she was promoted assistant professor in pharmacognosy at the University of Montpellier. Her research area focuses on medicinal chemistry, includes the synthesis and the evaluation of lipophenols derivatives to fight oxidative and carbonyl stress mechanism (neurodegenerative diseases), the discovery of natural lipophenol derivatives in vegetal sources, and the development of lipid-oxadiazolone inhibitors of lipolytic enzymes in mycobacteria. 

Jean-Marie Galano studied chemistry at Paul Cézanne University Marseille and obtained his PhD under the supervision of Honoré Monti in 2001. He then moved to the University of Oxford to pursue a postdoctoral fellowship with David H. Hodgson on the development of new methods for the total synthesis of natural products. In October 2005 he joined the CNRS as a Chargé de Recherche at the University of Montpellier. His research focuses on the total synthesis and discovery of new lipid metabolites, and to discover their potential implications in human health. 

Alexandre Guy was born in Albi (France) in 1970. He studied organic chemistry at the National Graduate School of Chemistry of Mulhouse (France), where he received his graduation and master degree in 1993. In 1998, he obtained his PhD at the University of Montpellier in the field of total synthesis of isoprostanes, under the supervision of Pr. Jean-Claude Rossi and Dr. Thierry Durand. At present he is an engineer at CNRS. His research interests are in the areas of organic synthesis, medicinal chemistry, particularly on total synthesis of oxygenated derivatives obtained in vivo from non enzymatic peroxidation of PUFAs.

Camille Oger was born in Saint-Gaudens (France) in 1984. She studied chemistry at Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse and University of Paris VI. She then moved to Montpellier and received her PhD in the field of total synthesis of neuroprostanes at the University of Montpellier II, in 2010. She did a post doctoral work with Pr. Ilan Marek at the Technion- Israel Institute of Technology and was promoted assistant professor at the University of Montpellier in 2011 and promoted associate professor in 2016. Her research interest includes the development of new strategies toward the synthesis of bioactive lipids, the quantitation of such metabolites and the discovery of biological activities. 

Claire Vigor studied Cellular and Physiological Biology, speciality Plant Physiology at University of Rennes and then the Agro-resource Sciences. She obtained her PhD in Phytochemistry in 2002 from the National Polytechnic Institute of Toulouse under the direction of Pr Moulis. After two ATER positions in the laboratory of Pharmacognosy of the Universities of Caen and then of Toulouse, she was promoted assistant professor at the University of Montpellier in 2005 and associate professor in 2019. After being interesting for a long time in the extraction, purification and characterization of natural (terpens, coumarins, polyphenols) or hemi-synthetic (lipophenols) secondary metabolites, she is now interested in targeted lipidomic with the profiling of non-enzymatic oxylipins.