With their natural scent of violets, the young champions in chemistry had a nose

You have to get up early to capture the scent of the violet Except for crushing astronomical quantities of this fragile flower, which specialists know to be “silent” in terms of smell. Manufacturers are also avoiding the drudgery and, to obtain the fragrance of the emblematic flower of the Pink City, they often content themselves with using derivatives of petrochemical products.

Hence the idea of ​​six Toulouse students (from Paul-Sabatier University and Insa) to obtain an ecological and sustainable fragrance of violet, based on genetically programmed yeasts and bacteria. The challenge was interested. When at the beginning of the summer of 2021, they decided to embark on the Elixio project and to confine themselves for three months in their lab rather than going to the beach, their ambition was quite simply to win iGEM, the prestigious global synthetic biology competition created by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The bet was therefore to do better than the Toulouse silver medalists of the previous year and their clever super-yeasts for astronauts.

A thesis to continue the adventure

Full box. “After three months, we detected a scent of violets above our yeasts,” assures Camille Pin, a member of the team. Then, after being cooked for 25 minutes – in Zoom format, Covid-19 requires – by a jury of specialists, the consecration arrived. Here are the Toulouse world champions of synthetic biology, in the youth category. Camille and her friends do not see the useful opportunity to add a nice line to their CV. “Above all, we have lived an enriching adventure, which made us grow and gain experience,” says the student.

And this epic could continue after a handover. A group specializing in aromas and fragrances and, inevitably, located in Grasse, was one of the team’s sponsors for iGem. “He is very interested in funding a thesis on the basis of our work”, explains Camille Pin. It floats like a scent of lasting success.

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