A global increase in the demand for wood products has been observed worldwide during the last decades. This trend is expected to continue in the future as a consequence of population growth. Additionally, the need for wood is augmented by the increasing substitution of fossil energy by wood biomass-based energy to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. This demand will not be satisfied by natural and naturally regenerated forests: they are threatened by high deforestation rates and forest degradation mainly in the tropics and the costs of wood mobilization in the temperate zones is a concern. Forest plantations (FP) are therefore expected to provide a large part of the global wood supply. Their ability to meet wood demand is limited by competing land uses. Higher stand yields must be obtained on soils that may not necessarily support such intensification especially as nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) exportations by biomass removal are generally not offset by fertilization. Therefore, FP sustainability is currently a major concern, particularly with regard to serious long-term N and P deficits. Innovative FP management schemes, and attractive to the stakeholders must be then deployed. The Intens&Fix project will deal with the ecological intensification of FP through the association of N2-fixing species (NFS) with the goal to increase stand production as, in particular, a result of better N and P availability in the soil. These systems hould combine positive environmental impacts while ensuring social-economical improvement of livelihood for smallholders or performances for commercial companies. The project will develop an experimental approach on various and complementary FP with associated NFS, both in France (Juglans sp. and Alnus cordata or herbaceous NFS in Languedoc, Populus sp + Robinia pseudoacacia. in North-Est of France) and in the Tropics (mixed-species plantations of Eucalyptus grandis and Acacia mangium in Brazil and Congo). An integrated biophysical model will be developed for the simulation of mixed species in FP. Outputs of virtual experiments performed with the biophysical model will feed a plantation-level model allowing to assess the economical feasibility and to test decision rules for the management of FP with NFS. Crossing models outputs and a survey of stakeholders’ innovation process concerning the use of NFS will entitle us to assess the potential development of these systems. The approach will be multidisciplinary and involve scientists working in ecophysiology, biogeochemistry, soil science, microbiology, silviculture, socio-economics, and modelling. This project will contribute to the production of innovative results i.e. refined methodological techniques for estimation of N transfer, documentation of mechanisms of competition/ facilitation for N and P bioavailability, model coupling water, N and C functioning adapted to mixed-species forests and practices (species, density…) to manage NFS in FP, and socio-economical assessment of these new management schemes. The results will be valorised through publications in high level scientific journals, as well as in R/D journals and participation to international conferences. More generally the involvement of a top resource partner in farm forestry and agroforestry, the participative approach deployed, and the strong partnership developed with producer organisations in France, Brazil and Congo will warrant a large and efficient dissemination of the Intens&Fix results. From an operational view point, the Intens&Fix project will provide tools of ecological intensification to significantly improve FP management with specific targets in eucalyptus plantations in Congo and Brazil (several millions ha), Very Short Rotation Coppices, and high value timber in agroforestry systems (potential of several millions ha in Europe).

Cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and obesity are major health problems in Western Europe and Northern America. The general nutritional recommendation is a lowering of lipids intake and an increase in the consumption of complex carbohydrates, with a promotion of food exhibiting a low Glycemic Index and a high dietary fibre content. Today the dietary fibre intake fails to meet the recommendations and in most cases the trend for population is to eat less fibre not more. The cereals products, one of the pillars of a healthy diet, clearly might help to increase dietary fibre intake in French population. The WHEAFI project aims at developing cereal food enriched with fibre selected for their nutritional properties. The objective of this project is to determine the ability of fibre enrichment to reduce chronic inflammatory processes in overweight population. These results could be extrapolated to the reduction of chronic nutrition diseases (as diabetes and CVD) in general population. Systemic inflammation is increasingly recognized as an important mediator of coronary artery disease, chronic degenerative diseases such as diabetes and Alzheimer dementia and other chronic diseases such as metabolic syndrome and obesity. Epidemiological studies have shown the reduction of coronary heart disease, of oxidant stress and of inflammation by intake of dietary fibre, cereal fibre (wheat bran) and whole grain. Unexpectedly, there are some contradictory results between studies that have evaluated the short and long term effects of wheat bran and whole grains on human health. However depending on their specific chemical structure, physico-chemical property (solubility/viscosity) and fermentation ability, cereal dietary fibre may have considerable different extent of effects. The main hypothesis of this project is that prebiotic effect of specific wheat dietary fibres (endosperm, aleurone), modulation of colic microflora and formation of SCFA (butyrate) contribute to the reduction of inflammatory process. A clinical study with food enriched in different wheat dietary fibres is proposed to explore the potential favourable effects as observed epidemiologically, and to understand the anti-inflammatory effect and long-term reduction of chronic diseases. In addition, new assay methods will be developed to assay AX and grain tissues. These assays will help to select wheat dietary fibres for their nutritional effects. This project gathers academic and industrial partners in order to bring new insights in the domain of nutrition and to help the development of cereal products with an improved nutritional quality.

Nitrate is the major mineral anion in cultivated plants and is essential for their N-nutrition. Although its uptake from the medium is energetically costly, numerous abiotic stresses (mechanic shocks, salinity, medium acidification...) induce a net root NO3- excretion into the medium. The physiological significance of this excretion remains obscure. It is nevertheless aknowledged that anion excretion is a major determinant for the control of electric polarization (and related signalization pathways) and osmotic potential in plant cells. For instance in guard cells, anion excretion leads in fine to stomata closure. The molecular knowledge of transport systems responsible for cellular efflux of NO3- in plants is scarce. One of the 3 partners of this project identified NAXT1 (NitrAte eXcretion Transporter 1), the first NO3- efflux transporter at the plasma membrane of plant cells (Segonzac et al., 2007, Plant Cell). NAXT1 is responsible for the massive root NO3- excretion to the external medium, triggered by acidification stresses. In Arabidopsis, the NAXT family encompasses 7 closely related genes whose expression is detected in roots at different levels. Upon salt stress, NAXT2 (another member) was found to be involved in NO3- excretion in the root stele and its translocation to shoots. Recently, one of the partners recently observed that NAXT1 and NAXT2 are also expressed in leaves, at the level of guard cells that constitute stomata. A first stomata-related phenotype was uncovered in salt stress conditions for a NAXT2 KO mutant (enhanced leaf transpiration rate compared to wild type plants). Also, NAXT1 and NAXT2 gene expression is regulated by the stress hormone ABA and salt stress. These first observations are of importance because stomata constitute an essential control point for plant tolerance to agronomicaly important stresses such as salinity and drought. For these reasons, it is proposed in the present project to study the role of NAXT transporters in stomatal movements in Arabidopsis, with the aim to uncover new plant tolerance factors to these stresses. In line with this proposal, the composition of our consortium allows to associate recognized expertise in (1) electrophysiological analyses of transport systems [Montpellier, BPMP], (2) anion channel and stomatal activity [Cadarache, IBEB-LEMS], and (3) Integrative biology of plants under environmental constraints [Montpellier, LEPSE]. First, the expression of NAXT genes will be searched for in guard cell RNAs extracted from plants submitted or not to treatments of interest (salt and water stress, ABA). Transport properties of selected NAXT members (expressed in stomata) will be characterized electrophysiologically after expression in Xenopus oocytes, and their expression profile in stomata will be documented at the gene and protein levels (in NAXT:GFP plants) in response to stresses and ABA. Then, NAXT underexpressing mutants will be phenotyped in response to stresses on their stomatal activity (aperture measurements, electrophysiology in situ) and by an integrative approach (tolerance to stresses in terms of growth/development, leaf transpiration rate) using a phenotyping platform (Phenopsis) developped by one of the partners. Beyond the deciphering of the biological role of the NAXT family, it is anticipated that this project will allow a better understanding of the beneficial role of nitrate supply observed at an agronomic level to plants under major abiotic stresses limiting production and thereby, to uncover new determinants of their tolerance.

This project aims at improving our understanding of the molecular basis of the properties of S.cerevisiae industrial wine yeasts. These strains exhibit specific capacity to ferment under stressful conditions and metabolic properties quite different from their laboratory counterpart, on which have been focused most of the research in yeast genomic. The genetic basis of the phenotypic differences between the industrial and laboratory strains are unknown. It is assumed that sequence polymorphisms determine such phenotypic variations. This project aims at identifying the sequence polymorphisms involved in the specific properties of these strains with a focus on the contribution of gene expression variation on these phenotypes. This project is positioned in the dynamic of a research field that aims at improving the understanding of the molecular basis of the intraspecific biodiversity in Saccharomyces sp. The achievement of this project will be based on the integration of three types of approaches, two of 'genetical genomic' which will aim at identifying simultaneously QTL involved in technological traits and in gene expression variation at the transcriptome scale, combined with an analysis of the genome sequence of an industrial yeast strain. The parallel search for QTL involved in expression variation and of those responsible of fermentation phenotypes should facilitate the identification of genes involved in technological traits. Moreover, the identification of expression QTL should open new possibilities to decipher the regulatory network variations underlying the expression variations and their potential impact in the yeast phenotypes. The project will be associated to a in depth analysis of the genome sequence of an industrioal yeast which is now available. This should permit an exploration of the relationship between structural polymorphisms and expression variation, at the genome scale. Given that yeast is an highly tractable micro-organism, a functional demonstration of the role of candidate genes should be obtained. This work represents therefore a significant aspect of the functional analysis of this new genome. The knowledge on both the function of the genes affected and the molecular mechanisms involved, should offer a global view on the adaptation of these yeast to stressful environments. This work should provide the frame for future general studies on the relation between genetic variation and phenotypic variation in these strains. The identification of key genes of the strains properties will have applied interest in relation with the opportunities opened in strain improvement.