qbio Workshop #4 on ‘De novo protein design’
October 2025
For the fourth edition of the qbio Workshop teaching unit, two renowned speakers were invited to present latest developments in de novo protein design.
It was with great pleasure that we welcomed Alexis Courbet (Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, USA) who spoke about the use of generative AI for designing genetically encodable nanomachines, as well as Danny Sahtoe (Hubrecht Institute, Netherlands) who shared about his team’s work on designing de novo proteins to be used as conformational and epigenetic control systems.
Leading up to the workshop, the M2 students worked in pairs to prepare presentations of two articles of each invited speaker in a journal club. The journal club was immediately followed by the respective speaker’s seminar, which was open to the scientific community in Montpellier. After each presentation, the students had an informal lunch with the speakers, providing the students a unique opportunity to discuss Science and the general aspects of a researcher’s life.
Retreat 2025: les Cévennes
May 2025
From 2-4 May 2025, the qbio community (faculty, current students, and alumni) in Montpellier gathered at La Maison Clément in the Cévennes. During the three days, the participants attended a talk by Stefano Magni, a researcher at the Luxembourg Institute of Health, who shared about his journey in scientific research and his current work in bio-informatics. The participants also went for a hike in the Cévennes and enjoyed spectacular views of nature in the South of France. Finally, participants did a brainstorming session to plan for the qbio bootcamp escape game in September for the incoming M1 students and provided feedback on the qbio programme to think of areas for improvement.
qbio Workshop #3 on ‘Single Particle Tracking’
October 2024
For the third edition of the qbio Workshop teaching unit, we welcomed two invited speakers exploring how the physical state of the cell shapes gene expression and cellular function.
We had the pleasure to host talks by Morgan Delarue (Laboratoire d’Analyse et d’Architecture des Systèmes, Toulouse), who presented his work on how macromolecular crowding regulates growth under mechanical confinement, and by Davide Normanno (Institut de Génétique Humaine, Montpellier), who discussed how single-molecule imaging reveals the dynamic organization of transcription and nuclear architecture.
Prior to the seminars, students worked in small groups to present key publications from each speaker, including studies on macromolecular crowding, transcriptional regulation, and nuclear organization. The journal clubs were followed by the invited seminars, open to the scientific community, and concluded with an informal lunch where students had the opportunity to discuss not only the scientific concepts presented, but also broader aspects of academic research and career development.
BOOTCAMP 4.0
September 2024
To kick off the start of their qbio journey, the M1 and M2 students participated in an escape game organised by faculty and alumni. Several activities were designed referencing the contents of the qbio bootcamp learning module. Students had to use the knowledge about cell biology, biochemistry, informatics, physics, and probability that they learned during the bootcamp and work together as a team to solve the puzzles and earn a special reward.
Retreat 2024: les Cévennes
March 2024
In March 2024, the qbio community gathered for the annual retreat at La Maison Clément. The program was a mix of scientific discussions and collective activities. An alumnus, Ali, gave a talk on Computational Structural Biology: Molecular Modeling and Dynamics, sharing insights into his academic journey and current research. We were also joined by Cédric Leyrat (Institut de Génomique Fonctionnelle, Montpellier), who contributed additional lectures and discussions on AI-based Molecular Modelling.
A highlight of the retreat was the escape game, entirely designed by M1 and M2 students, who brainstormed and worked together to create an original game for the new incoming M1 students. This initiative encouraged interaction across cohorts and provided a fun introduction to the program. Beyond the scientific and creative activities, participants enjoyed hiking in the surrounding area, informal discussions, and many shared moments that helped strengthen the qbio community spirit. Overall, Retreat 2024 was both stimulating and enjoyable for everyone involved.
qbio Workshop #2 on ‘Molecular Machines’
November 2023
For the second edition of the qbio Workshop teaching unit, we received three renowned invited speakers tackling different aspects of ‘Molecular Machines’.
We had the pleasure to host talks on phase separations of bacterial DNA segregation complexes (Jean-Charles Walter, Laboratoire Charles Coulomb, Montpellier), on the complexity of the bacterial flagellar motor (Ashley Nord, Centre de Biologie Structurale, Montpellier), and on the molecular aspects of the replication mechanisms of the Chikungunya virus (Juan Reguera, AFMB, Marseille).
When the topics where announced, students picked their preferred one and worked in small groups to present two articles of each invited speaker in the morning. The journal club was immediately followed by the speaker’s seminar (open to the scientific community in Montpellier). After that, the M2 qbio had an informal lunch with the speakers, which was the occasion to exchange not only about Science, but also on general the aspects of a researcher’s life.
BOOTCAMP 3.0
September 2023
The M1 graduates were warmly greeted with an exhilarating escape game (Bacterial olympic games!) organized by the M2 seniors.
The activities were thoughtfully designed by the M2 students in collaboration with faculty members to align with the curriculum of the Bootcamp, the teaching unit that welcomes the new coming students.
Following the game, students and faculty enjoyed a delightful evening in Montpellier, strengthening their bonds outside the academic setting.
Retreat 2023: Ardèche
April 2023
From April 14th to 16th, we held our annual retreat at the Les Stelles gîte in Ardèche.
Students from both years worked alongside faculty members and two invited guests: Remy Kusters, a senior researcher and data scientist at GOURMEY, and Mohamed El Beheiry, co-founder and CTO of Avatar Medical. Our discussions with them provided valuable insights into alternative non-academic curricula and the transition ‘from lab to startup’ in very different fields such as cultivated meat development and immersive virtual reality imaging for medical purposes.
During the retreat, students interacted with our guests and developed new material for next year’s Bootcamp – our ‘warming up’ teaching unit at the beginning of the academic year. We also decided to increase our social media presence. Stay tuned for updates!
qbio Workshop #1 on ‘Transcription’
November 2022
In November 2022 we inaugurated the qbio Workshop teaching unit. For its first edition, we received three renowned invited speakers tackling different aspects of ‘Transcription’.
Students picked their preferred topic and worked in small groups to organise a presentation based on two articles of each invited speaker. After the speaker’s seminar (open to the scientific community in Montpellier), the M2 qbio had the occasion to exchange about the presentation during and after lunch, in informal sessions that were not limited to the scientific content but also touched on career advice.
The work did not end up that week of November. Each group spent a couple of months to write the proceedings of the meeting, attempting to summarise in a few pages the salient points of the speakers’ results.
“The telescope vs. the microscope”
October 2022
On October 25th 2022, we took advantage of a partial solar eclipse in Montpellier to organize an outdoor practical for our qbio master students : “The microscope vs the telescope”
It was a fun way to revise some basic optics concepts, see how a telescope and a microscope are designed, the similarities and differences, talk about magnification, aperture, aberrations, and other wonders of nature.
iGEM 2022 GRAND JAMBOREE
October 2022
Our students defended the coulours of the University of Montpellier in the world’s largest synthetic biology competition (iGEM).
Over 350 teams from all over the world participated in this 3-day exposition (Grand Jamboree) in Paris.
This year, the Montpellier team was exceptionally composed of only 5 qbio students, who idealised, developed, and presented their project Shell’lock, a user-friendly technique to detect oyster pathogens based on a Cas13 enzyme.
We are proud of our students who were 1st runner up, 2nd position among all the overgraduates teams, and obtained five nominations (Best Food & Nutrition project, presentation, wiki, entrepreneurship, Integrated human practices) in addition to the gold medal.
This has been an incredible achievement for Ali, Christelle, Émilie, Hye Rin, Nessim, congratulations again!
If you want to re-live their presentation and the prize ceremony, you can do that from the 2022 Grand Jamboree website.
Bootcamp 2022
September 2022
We welcomed our new M1 graduates with an intense and fun bootcamp 2.0. The senior M2 students conceived, prepared and animated the second escape game during the bootcamp. To celebrate the beginning of this new year, all qbio students and some faculty members enjoyed a night out in Montpellier.
Retreat 2022: les Cevennes
April 2022
Our first annual retreat took place at “La Maison Clément” gîte in the Cevennes at the end of April. Students and some faculty members as well as invited speakers enjoyed fun games, a beautiful hike and picnic as well as animated evenings. We had the chance to hear from Xiaojing who talked about her research work on molecular modeling of GPCRs.
