Dr François Thomas, an independent researcher with the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS, France) has been named as the newest winner of the Rachel Carson Environmental Conservation Excellence Award.

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The prize is part of the Applied Microbiology International Horizon Awards, which celebrate the brightest minds in the field and promote the research, group, projects, products and individuals who continue to help shape the future of applied microbiology

The prestigious scientific award is designed for professionals, researchers, and innovators who have made significant contributions to the conservation of marine and terrestrial ecosystems and the preservation of biodiversity. It honours their efforts in addressing critical environmental challenges and safeguarding natural habitats, emphasising the real-world impacts in these essential areas.

Dr Thomas is an applied and environmental microbiologist with a strong background in molecular biology and biochemistry. 

Strategies of bacteria

The overarching goal of his research is to decipher some of the strategies bacteria use to perform critical biogeochemical transformations, and to quantify their ecological impact. He uses interdisciplinary approaches to gain insights into which environmental bacteria can perform these processes, how they do it, and how it varies depending on the conditions. 

Over the years, he has investigated multiple aspects of microbiology in marine and terrestrial environments, including mangrove estuaries, salt marshes, polluted soils, deep-sea hydrothermal vents and algal beds. 

Coastal ecosystems

“My research is now centred on the diversity of alga-degrading bacteria in coastal ecosystems, the dissection of their metabolic pathways, the regulations involved, the consequences for carbon fluxes and their biotechnology potential, bridging detailed molecular understanding of degradation processes to broader microbial ecology questions,” he says.

Dr Thomas received his doctorate in Microbiology and Biochemistry from the University Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris, France) in 2011, and held post-doctoral positions in environmental microbiology and ‘omics’ techniques at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (USA) and Interdisciplinary Laboratory on Continental Ecosystems (Nancy, France). In 2015, François Thomas was appointed as a permanent PI at the CNRS Roscoff Marine Station (France). 

To find out more about AMI’s Grants and Awards programme, visit https://appliedmicrobiology.org/membership-community/grants-awards.html.

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