BIOCOM Team

Animation : Sophie Bourgeteau-Sadet

The BIOCOM team currently comprises 5 permanent researchers, 3 technical staff and 8 non-permanent scientists (2 PhD students, 3 post-doctorates and 1 research engineer). The BIOCOM team research project is included in the disciplinary field of the microbial ecology and more specifically in the comprehension of microbial communities’ ecology and their role in the biological functioning of soils, mostly in agricultural environments..

This research project is composed of 3 axes:

•         Axis 1: Biogeography of soils’ microbial communities

Here, the objectives are to characterize the spatial and temporal distribution of microbial communities and to understand the ecological processes determining these distribution profiles, in order to prioritize the environmental factors involved. This biogeographical approach is deployed on scales ranging from landscapes of 1000 ha to territories of several thousand square kilometers.

•          Axis 2: The role of microbial community diversity in the biological functioning of soils

The aim is to understand the extent to which the diversity (taxonomic and/or functional) of microbial communities is a determining factor in soil biological functions and associated services. The functions considered are linked to soil carbon dynamics (turnover of organic matter, evolution of carbon stocks), soil structuring, plant functioning (productivity and response to stress) and air quality (emissions of Volatile Organic Compounds), all in response to changes in agricultural practices, notably the input of organic matter (crop residues, compost, animal droppings, etc.).

•          Axis 3 : Soil microbiological quality for agroecological transition and land management.

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Here, the objective is highly focused, since it involves producing tools for diagnosing soil microbiological quality (bioindicators; reference systems; predictive models), which form the basis of management tools (Decision Support Tools) and support for farmers as they move towards agroecological transition. This axis is based on collaboration with players from the agricultural world (advisors, technical institutes, etc.) as well as associations, and involves participative approaches based on a continuum of: training - measurement - transfer.

From a methodological and technical point of view, the BIOCOM team's research is based on three pillars:

• mass sampling strategies and monitoring methods to consider a wide range of pedoclimatic contexts
• molecular biology tools for unprecedented characterization of the abundance, diversity and functional potential of microbial communities directly from soil-extracted DNA: microbial molecular biomass, targeted and/or unprecedented mass sequencing
• an analytical continuum for data mining and modeling, including a bioinformatics pipeline (BIOCOM-PIPE), benchmarking tools (ReClustOR), and statistical tools to characterize communities (diversity indices, beta-diversity, interaction networks, functional inference

Personnels permanents :

Bourgeteau-Sadet Sophie, PR,Institute Agro Dijon

Chemidlin Prévost-Bouré Nicolas, PR Institute Agro Dijon

Dequiedt Samuel, IE, INRAE

Maron Pierre-Alain, DR, INRAE

Ranjard Lionel, DR, INRAE

Terrat Sebastien, MCF, UBFC

Tripied Julie, TFR, Institute Dijon

Horrigue Walid, IR, Institute Dijon

Contractors:

Perrin Solène, AI

Doctorates and post-doctorates

Salguero Daniela Mora, doctorate

Jarrige Domitille, Post-Doctoral fellow