Jean-Jacques Mr

Fournié

Mr Éric

Ahmed Mr

Ashour

Nicolas Mr

Bourmeyster

Ms Anne Galy

Mr Ramon

Garcia Sanz

Hinrich Mr

IGBMC Gronemeyer

Eyal Mr

Gottlieb

Arjan W Mr

Griffioen

Ken Mr

Herrmann

Ms Brigitte Kerfelec

Michael F Mr

Olson

evaluation by the experts committee, the composition of which is specified below.

The Cancer Research Center of Toulouse (CRCT) is part of the Toulouse Oncopole located south west of the city of Toulouse. The Oncopole was built in the recent years on the site of the AZF chemical factory blast that occurred on september 21, 2001. It is a 220 hectares site, well connected to the airport, highways, university and hospitals. The Oncopole includes a cancer care center (university, Institute of Cancer -IUC, 304 beds and places), the french operator of blood transfusion (EFS), pharmaceutical and biotech companies (Pierre Fabre and Sanofi mainly) and public research laboratories (ITAV, Institute of Advanced Technologies for life sciences -and CRCT). The CRCT building is a 13,000 m 2 building including 8,000 m 2 host labs, core facilities, offices and services. The research center is connected directly (corridors) to the cancer care center. A large animal facility is located on the ground floor, below the labs and other facilities. The current research teams arrived on site mid-2014, a few weeks before the HCERES site-visit. Most of the teams belonging to the CRCT plan are located in this new buidling, excepted two teams hosted in the closely connected care center.

Management team

The CRCT is headed by Mr Jean-Jacques FOURNIÉ, supported by the deputy director Mr Stéphane PYRONNET and the administrative director Mr Sébastien GUIBERT, forming the direction board. 2  Overall assessment of the unit

HCERES nomenclature

Global assessment of the unit

The Cancer Research Center of Toulouse (CRCT) is a multidisciplinary research center dedicated to cancer. It was composed of 12 teams located in 5 different places in Toulouse when created in 2011. All the teams moved together very recently to a new building of the Toulouse Oncopole, closely linked to the anticancer clinical center. Taking advantage of this new place with a very high potential, the project of CRCT for the next 5 years includes the emergence of 5 new teams (17 teams in total, numbered 1-18 with a skip). The program includes strong basic and translational projects dedicated to tumor progression, cell metabolism, and the development of new anticancer therapies. Hematological malignancies occupy a central place in this program.

The CRCT is planned to be organised into four departments dedicated to tumor progression (team 1, 2 and 3), metabolism and cell death, tumor growth, immunity (team 4, 5 ,6 and 17), leukemias and lymphomas (team 7, 8, 9, 16 and 18) and new cancer drugs (team 10, 11, 12, 13 and 15).

Most teams develop research programs that are connected to the care center and related to specific malignancies, with a dominant role of onco-hematology (multiple myeloma, non-hodgkin lymphoma, acute myeloid leukemia) but also programs dedicated to diverse solid tumors. The care center hosts a biobank of 21,000 annotated clinical samples, including tumor and control tissues. There is a strong intent to further enforce the translational aspects of the research, and to develop new drugs in oncology.

The CRCT is connected with several structures that have been created and awarded in the recent years, including CAPTOR (Cancer Pharmacology of Toulouse Oncopole and Region), a program that received 10M€ over 5 years through the Investissements d'Avenir (Partnership with Sanofi, Pierre Fabre and Affichem), and TOUCAN, a Laboratoire d'Excellence (LabEx) granted in 2013 with 5M€ over 5 years to explore therapeutic resistance in hematological cancers (partnership with Innate Pharma). These two programs funded equipements and teams in the CRCT.

The center is also connected to the ONCODEVICE initiative launched in the setting of the IDEX/PRES Université de Toulouse to develop new technologies and nanodevices in partnership with a CNRS Physics lab. Lastly, the center planned to create a collection of cell lines from its own tumor bank in order to screen new drug candidates, in a manner similar to that created by the National Cancer Institute in the US (NCI60-like set).

The CRCT is today in a transient phase. The center is nicely organized and obtained a 10% increase in its resources in the last 3 years. All the needed committees have been set up, and they appear to be nicely organized and very efficient. The regroupment of the teams in a brand new building now offers a unique and tremendous opportunity to set up an ambitious strategy in order to get international visibility, to recruit outstanding researchers, and to further promote excellence. Such a strategy has to be built in strong link with the hospital, including clinical research direction, in order to develop a comprehensive cancer center. Such a strategy may be supported by the national programs (Cancer Pharmacology of Toulouse Oncopole and Region, CAPTOR, LabEx TOUCAN), together with the university and the Regional Council, in order to create packages that will enforce attraction of outstanding teams, which was almost impossible to organise before team grouping in a unique site with empty space and development perspectives.

Strengths and opportunities in relation to the context

The center groups a panel of excellent and very good teams with complementary expertise in fundamental and translational research.

The management is excellent, with researchers, engineers, technicians and students in a very positive and open minded spirit, and a series of well-equipped facilities.

There is a close connection with the clinics in Oncology (in the building and through integration of physicians in the research teams) offering unique opportunities for very strong translational medicine.

The CRCT is hosted in a brand new building that offers impressive space: dispersed on 5 independent sites until recently, the teams will now interact more easily in a single building linked to the hospital to build their common strategy taking advantage of the site and the surrounding structures (Pharma companies, blood transfusion, other research institutes).

The CRCT has established excellent core facilities, including a large and technologically impressive animal facility with programs that may strongly support the objectives of the research teams.

Weaknesses and threats related to the context

The CRCT is still too much Toulouse-centered. Recently grouped on the unique site, the center has to build a strategy to attract outstanding international talents, junior ATIP/Avenir teams, and international students and postdoctoral fellows. Young teams will need to be mentored by external researchers in the field.

The global strategy of the CRCT may facilitate interactions between teams and by working in close connection with the cancer care center to further enforce the interactions through well-identified and granted programs, from basic to clinical research, including MD-PhD tracks in oncology and programs to exploit the biobank of 21,000 samples.

The global strategy may define how to increase the International visibility of this relatively new center, and to collect more funding from the European Community (including ERC grants and Marie-Curie fellowships).

Efforts might be done to increase the number of post-doctoral researchers in the research teams, and to develop genomic facilities, together with a bioinformatic core facility.

The role of the four proposed research departments may be clarified. A more flexible organisation, for example on the basis of common programs that can evolve with time, could be envisioned.

Recommendations

The CRCT being now closely connected to a cancer dedicated clinic, all the efforts must be focused on the strategy for the next 5 years: how to exploit the added value of coming on such a brand new site, how to create a comprehensive cancer center and give to this center, in functional connection with surrounding private and public research groups, a strong international visibility?

The recruitment of international outstanding teams might be the next priority. When these teams will be installed, international meetings will help to increase the visibility of the site.

The center may favor the attraction of foreign students and post-doctoral researchers and impose English as the scientific language in internal meetings.

  Scientific delegate representing the HCERES: Ms Maryam MEHRPOUR Representatives of the unit's supervising institutions and bodies: Mr Michel ATTAL, cancer care center Ms Armelle BARELLI, Inserm Mr Alain EYCHENE, CNRS Ms Christelle GUEGAN, Inserm Ms Marie-Josèphe LEROY-ZAMIA, Inserm Mr Philippe VALET (representative of the Doctoral School "Biologie-Santé-Biotechnologies" n°151) Mr Alexis VALENTIN, Université Toulouse 3 Paul Sabatier 1  Introduction History and geographical location of the unit

Unit workforce Unit workforce Number as at 30/06/2014 Number as at 01/01/2016 N1: Permanent

	SVE1_LS1, SVE1_LS2
	professors and similar positions	40	41
	N2: Permanent researchers from Institutions and similar positions	42	39
	N3: Other permanent staff (without research duties)	38	38
	N4: Other professors (Emeritus Professor, on-contract Professor, etc.)
	N5: Other researchers (Emeritus Research Director, Postdoctoral	28	28
	students, visitors, etc.)
	N6: Other contractual staff (without research duties)	14
	TOTAL N1 to N6	162	146

Unit workforce Number as at 30/06/2014 Number as at 01/01/2016

	Doctoral students	50
	Theses defended	67
	Postdoctoral students having spent at least 12 months in the unit	28
	Number of Research Supervisor Qualifications (HDR) taken	15
	Qualified research supervisors (with an HDR) or similar positions	64	64


Dumas

Ms Elisabeth Jamet

Mr Bernard Dumas

Thierry Mr

Inra Rouxel

Thiverval-Grignon

Paul Mr

James Birch

Azeddine Mr

Driouich

Ms Franziska Krajinski-Barth

Fabrice Mr

Wattebled

Steven G Mr

Ball

Gaude

Claude Mr

Maranges

Alexis Mr

Valentin

This report is the result of the evaluation by the experts committee, the composition of which is specified below.

 Introduction History and geographical location of the unit

The LRSV (Laboratoire de Recherche en Sciences Végétales, formerly SCSV-Surfaces Cellulaires et Signalisation chez les Végétaux) UMR is a joint laboratory (Unité Mixte de Recherche, UMR 5546) of the Paul Sabatier (UPS)-Toulouse 3 University and the CNRS (INSB). The joint unit currently contains 23 teaching staff members (professors and assistant professors) and 10 CNRS researchers (directeurs de recherche and chargés de recherche). The technical staff is composed of 25 members (13 UPS and 12 CNRS) ranging from Ingénieur de recherche to AJT. There are currently 21 PhD students and 4 postdocs.

The budget of the lab is in the 950 k€ range per year.

LRSV moved in 1999 from the main UPS campus in Rangueil (Toulouse) to the INRA campus of Auzeville close to Toulouse where it is now located. During the evaluated period, the UMR went through significant restructuring, both in terms of staff movement (in and out) and team number and structure. Overall, respectively 18 permanent staff left the unit and 17 joined. This represents a turnover of one third of the permanent staff.

Management team

Since 2011, LRSV has been directed by the Dr Elisabeth JAMET/Pr Christophe ROUX tandem as director/deputy director. An administration manager, Ms Michèle ESCASSUT (CNRS engineer) is in charge of coordinating the "common facilities" service. The management team is assisted by the laboratory council and the scientific council. LRSV encompasses 6 scientific research teams with a high level of scientific autonomy, each of which is managed by a group leader. For the next period, it is proposed that a new management team takes the lead, comprising Dr Bernard DUMAS (DR2 CNRS) as director and Prof Vincent BURLAT (PR UPS) as deputy director. 2  Overall assessment of the unit

HCERES nomenclature

Sous domaine AEE (Agronomie

Global assessment of the unit

LRSV is a research entity devoted to research on plant development, adaption to biotic and abiotic stresses, the analysis of endomycorrhyzal fungal symbiosis and plant pathogenic oomycetes. The scientific production of the unit is excellent with some important breakthroughs obtained in a series of domains, resulting in publications in very high Impact Factor journals. Widely accessed on-line databases contribute to the appeal of the scientific production of the unit. The interaction with the socio-economic world is very good, with some notable successes, but shows a high level of disparity from one team to the other. There are successful efforts to interact significantly with industry. The overall management and organisation of the unit has been excellent-to-outstanding over the evaluation period. LRSV is strongly involved in teaching and organisation of teaching at UPS in a variety of areas. Training of students through research activities is also strong at LRSV and the unit is considered excellent for this criterion. The unit should aim to strengthen its international reputation and develop further its international and national collaboration networks to increase its attractiveness to recruit high quality foreign PhDs and postdoctoral fellows.

Strengths and opportunities in relation to the context

Close proximity to the main UPS campus and a strong involvement of university staff in teaching at UPS provides an excellent platform to attract students and LRSV hosts an impressive number of PhD and other postgraduate students who strongly contribute to the quality of the research. Numerous opportunities are available and have been seized to explore collaboration and joint funding with teams in similar fields of expertise in the local region (for example, LabEx TULIP, the Research Federation AIB (Agrobiosciences, Interaction and Biodiversity)). This further enhances the potential for high-impact research through collaboration. There is also a very dynamic regional environment for translational research. The unit is embracing this opportunity with a number of initiatives, such as BioPlantProtect, which brings together expertise in plant and microbial genomics at the unit with industrial partners keen to seek natural products that promote plant protection. Some of the specific research areas and topics are highly original, with little competition internationally (for example, the research on Eucalyptus and Arbuscular Mycorrhizae (AM) fungi).

Weaknesses and threats related to the context

The research entity is organised as six independent teams, each one having its own leadership and scientific policy, and common facilities overseen by an administration manager. Anticipated short-term retirement of key persons in the common facility services (including the administration manager) represents a major challenge for the unit, as external contracts, for example, are increasingly complex to audit. Despite an improvement since the last evaluation, the lack of attractiveness of the LRSV can still be perceived as a threat to the recruitment of highly qualified international post-docs and foreign PhD students. The move toward translational research is inequally distributed between teams. The reduction in time to complete a PhD project to three years, coupled with the requirement for a publication within that period, has the potential for premature publication of research that could be targeted to higher impact journals, given sufficient time. Finally, the demographic profile of the unit highlights an ageing population of CNRS researchers.

Recommendations

The unit needs an active policy to attract new, up-and-coming research leaders to apply for CNRS positions with them.

The quality of research is excellent but there is a need to increase international visibility. To help facilitate this, the committee of experts strongly recommends that the laboratory should implement a 'policy of participation' for all PhD students at international congresses.

A number of topics that link teams have been developed as collaborative, multidisciplinary projects facilitated by the sharing of PhD students. This, however, remains the exception rather than the rule, and more collaboration between teams should be promoted. Some of the teams have strong links and on-going collaboration with LIPM (mainly) and other local institutions through the FR AIB and common projects in the frame of the TULIP LabEx. However, it is important to increase relevant collaborations with local teams involved in similar research topics to build critical mass and overall impact.

The anticipated short-term retirement of key personnel in the common facility services (including the administration manager) is an important issue for the unit and it is recommended that the research unit finds an adequate solution to this issue.

The panel recommends that the strong collaborations and interactions between LRSV and LIPM (Laboratoire Interactions Plantes Microorganismes) are further enhanced by joint organisation of PhD and post-doctoral fellows meetings between the units.

Efforts should be pursued to enhance access to the Genotoul platform. Also the panel believes that the unit must increase its bioinformatics strength to meet the amount of analyses anticipated by metabolomic and phenomic approaches.

There is a strong history of translational research within certain LRSV teams. The panel firmly supports the vision to build translational research into the overall scientific culture and mission of the unit.

The panel recommends that the unit develops a clear strategy to link with, and exploit, the opportunities presented by the Botanical Garden, both in terms of public engagement and scientific (biodiversity) research.

Unit workforce Unit workforce Number as at 30/06/2014 Number as at 01/01/2016 N1: Permanent professors

	Écologie Environnement)
	Sous-domaine prinicpal SVE2 LS3
	Sous-domaine secondaire SVE2 LS9
	and similar positions	23	23
	N2: Permanent researchers from Institutions and similar positions	10	9
	N3: Other permanent staff (without research duties)	25	24
	N4: Other professors (Emeritus Professor, on-contract Professor, etc.)	2	2

N5: Other researchers (Emeritus Research Director, Postdoctoral students, visitors, etc.) N6: Other contractual staff (without research duties) 8 TOTAL N1

to N6 68 58 Unit workforce Number as at 30/06/2014 Number as at 01/01/2016

	Doctoral students	21
	Theses defended	32
	Postdoctoral students having spent at least 12 months in the unit	7.5
	Number of Research Supervisor Qualifications (HDR) taken	6
	Qualified research supervisors (with an HDR) or similar positions	24	24