Speakers - COMM

 Bio: After undergraduate studies at ENSC Toulouse (now ENSIACET), N. Mézailles obtained his Ph.D. from Purdue University (USA, Prof. C. P. Kubiak) in 1997. Following a post doc with prof. P. Le Floch, he joined CNRS in the same laboratory (UMR 7653, Prof. F. Mathey) in 1998. He is currently Research Director 1st class (DR1). In 2012, he joined the LHFA (UMR 5069), creating the team “Systèmes de hautes énergies”. In recent years, N. Mézailles has been mostly interested in the reduction of N₂ by designed transition metal complexes and main group elements. In December 2021, he co-founded the start-up SWAN-H.

Topic: Ammonia (NH₃) production is essential to mankind, being the source of N-containing fertilizers. It is synthesized on 200 Mt/year scale via the Haber-Bosch process, which relies on fossil fuels (grey H-B). It generates ca 2% of worldwide CO₂ emissions. Greener alternatives to NH₃ synthesis are needed. In SWAN-H, we strive to develop an NH₃ electrolyzer that operates under mild conditions, compatible with the use of renewable energies. It is based on the discovery that R₂B radicals can react efficiently with the inert molecule N₂ in the SHEN team at LHFA.

Bio: Pauline Rullière holds a PhD in Organic Chemistry and an engineering degree in Molecular Biology and Chemistry. She is an expert in green chemistry, biosynthesis and continuous flow technologies. As the R&D Director at Pili since early 2024, she leads a team of 20 researchers in metabolic engineering, fermentation, bioprocess and organic chemistry. Sustainable innovation is at the heart of her conception of research, driving a multidisciplinary team that leverages the synergy between synthetic biology and green chemistry. She is the author of 15 peer-reviewed scientific publications and the inventor of 4 patents. 

Topic: The color industry relies almost exclusively on fossil-based chemistry, generating significant CO₂ emissions and hazardous waste. Pili is a French chemical company developing sustainable dyes, pigments, and aromatic building blocks through a hybrid process combining microbial fermentation and organic synthesis. This approach enables the production of high performance and scalable colors with 50–100% biobased content and a targeted >50% CO₂ reduction. Pili’s solutions include biobased indigo for denim, organic pigments, and bioaromatic intermediates produced at ton scale, offering drop in replacements for petrochemical products and contributing to the decarbonization of the chemical industry.

Bio: Louise Breloy is a polymer chemistry researcher at the SoftMat laboratory, affiliated with the University of Toulouse. She graduated with a master's degree jointly from ENSCP and Sorbonne University in 2018 and earned a PhD in chemistry from ICMPE in 2022, where her research focused on the development of bio-based photocurable resins with antibacterial properties. She then completed an industrial postdoctoral fellowship at ESPCI, focusing on the enzymatic recycling of polyesters, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Polymat on the chemical recycling and upcycling of complex waste. She is currently developing various sustainable approaches for the recycling and recovery of plastic waste.

Topic: Enzymatic depolymerization yields basic polymer building blocks that can be repolymerized to regenerate high-quality plastics. While this approach works for easily sortable, unformulated PET waste, such as bottles, it fails for other PET sources and important polyesters like PBT. Pre-treating waste by melt mixing or vitrimerization, using controlled proportions of heterogeneous, unsortable polyester waste, allows the formation of copolymers or networks, readily depolymerized by esterase enzymes, thanks to the catalysts already present.

Bio: Michel Sigrist obtained his PhD in chemistry from the University of Strasbourg in 2024 at the Institut de Sciences et d’Ingénierie Supramoléculaires (ISIS) under the supervision of Dr. Paweł Dydio. His doctoral research focused on the development of efficient regio- and enantioselective methodologies for the palladium-catalysed carbonylation of readily available alkenes, alongside mechanistic investigations of these transformations. In 2025, he joined the University of Toulouse at the Laboratoire de Chimie de Coordination (LCC) as a postdoctoral researcher with Dr. Antoine Simonneau. His current research centers on hydrogenation reactions catalysed by pentahydrido molybdenum complexes.

Topic: Homogeneous hydrogenation is a powerful tool in organic synthesis, yet its widespread implementation is dominated by platinum group metal (PGM)-based catalysts. While these systems exhibit exceptional activity and selectivity, concerns regarding their scarcity, environmental impact, and toxicity increasingly cast doubt on their long-term sustainability. Herein, we report an alternative based on an earth-abundant metal-based molybdenum pentahydride complex, [MoH₅(depe)₂]⁺, which exhibits efficient alkene hydrogenation under mild conditions. Mechanistic studies combining kinetics, intermediate identification, and DFT calculations reveal its unique reactivity. This work place molybdenum polyhydrides as promising, environmentally friendly platforms for next-generation hydrogenation catalysis.

Bio: Israel Tonatiuh Pulido-Díaz is a young investigator specialized in Organometallic and Coordination Chemistry. He earned his Ph.D. in a Cotutelle Program between University of Toulouse and UNAM-Mexico (August 2025) supported by the IFAL’s excellence scholarship. His research focuses on sustainable catalysis, including design of hybrid materials and metal complexes for biomass valorisation, CO2 utilization, and green chemistry. With expertise in both homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis, Israel has mentored students and fostered collaborative research networks between Mexico and France. He aims to develop catalytic methodologies that reduce environmental impact and optimize raw material efficiency, contributing to create paths towards a circular bio-based economy.

Topic: Supported metal nanocatalyst for valorisation of biomass derived substrates

The development of efficient and selective catalytic systems for the valorization of biomass-derived substrates represents a critical effort in sustainable chemistry. In this study, we present hybrid metal nano-catalysts (Mo, Co) supported on molecularly modified silicas for hydrogenation and oxidation reactions. These systems exhibit remarkable catalytic activity and recyclability achieving high conversion and selectivity towards valuable products employing low metal loading. Structural and spectroscopic investigations highlight the positive role of support modification for better catalytic performance. This work offers a promising route for the development of environmentally friendly processes in the emerging bio-based chemical industry.

Bio: Graduated in Chemistry from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ, Brazil), Lucas Raggio was awarded a CAPES/BRAFITEC excellence scholarship, which enabled him to obtain an engineering degree from ESPCI Paris. He is currently pursuing a PhD in Molecular Chemistry at the Laboratoire Hétérochimie Fondamentale et Appliquée (LHFA, University of Toulouse). His previous experience mainly involves organic synthesis, and his current research focuses on the interface between molecular chemistry and polymer chemistry, with a particular interest in developing more sustainable materials, especially through the design of degradable polymers using innovative polymerization strategies.

Topic: The environmental impact caused by plastics is a major issue nowadays. A significant proportion of polymers used in everyday life have backbones composed exclusively of C–C bonds, which makes their degradation extremely slow. Polymers containing cleavable C–X bonds (X = heteroatom) can be prepared by copolymerizing a heterocycle with vinyl monomers via radical ring-opening polymerization (rROP). In collaboration with the Radical Chemistry Institute (ICR – Aix-Marseille University), we have identified and synthesized promising targets by tuning the structural parameters of these heterocycles.