University of Nantes

There is a high demand to design approaches capable of tracking the origin of biomarkers in complex biological environments, in the areas of life, environmental, food and forensic sciences. Metabolomics and Fluxomics show great promises towards this aim, and a high potential arises from their combination with Isotopic fingerprinting at natural abundance. The resulting isotopomics approach requires cutting-edge analytical tools, and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) is currently the only generic technique giving access to the site-specific isotope content at natural abundance. The detection of very small relative variations between samples originating from different (bio)chemical pathways is possible through 13C isotopic NMR, which can however only be applied to simple and concentrated samples, due to its low sensitivity. Consequently, numerous applications are out of reach. To tackle the current limitations of 13C isotopic analysis, SUMMIT will develop a groundbreaking analytical workflow relying on two of the most powerful NMR methods: dissolution dynamic nuclear polarization and ultrafast 2D NMR. This cutting-edge approach will allow the simultaneous measurement of 13C fingerprints from multiple low-concentrated biomarkers in complex mixtures, which is impossible with existing methods. The high potential of this analytical strategy will be demonstrated on a relevant biological study, the investigation of breast cancer cell metabolism, through applications with gradually increasing risk levels. These approaches will make it possible to identify (i) new biomarkers to discriminate between cell lines expressing different hormonal receptors; (ii) novel potential therapeutic targets from the elucidation of metabolic pathways. Beyond this application, the project will have a high impact on a wide community of academic and industrial researchers, covering unmet needs from life sciences, food industry and forensic analysis.

While the history of translation is a field in Humanities that has known a significant increase recently worldwide, a European history of literary translation during the war has yet to be written. Due to the importance of power relations, ideology, censorship and propaganda, the practice of literary translation and European translators in wartime is a particularly interesting configuration, but it remained relatively unexplored so far on a truly European level: few comprehensive researches have been carried out on literary translation in Europe during this constrained historical context, unlike on translation practices during peacetime. What was translated (how and by whom) whilst wars were destroying bonds between people and States? What meaning does one then invest translation with? Focussing on World War 2, a very significant period of 20th century European history, the TranslAtWar (Literary Translations at War) research project aims at investigating how literary translation then contributed to the understanding of History in the making, and, reciprocally, how History contributed to the analysis of multiple forms of literary translation. It is about questioning the circulation of ideas and culture through translation, and equally taking a close interest in the role of the agents of these circulations, both male and female translators, during wartime. We will also question the impact that the practice of translation in such exceptional historical circumstances had on the intellectual and cultural development of several countries, and what it is likely to have contributed given their position (central or peripheral) in the world of European literature. Under my supervision and taking advantage of long-standing international partnerships and expertise, this innovative project aims at writing a new page of European history and, eventually, promoting the emergence of a new disciplinary field at the crossroads of translation studies and war studies.