Julien Barthélémy contributes to advancing research. He completed a three-year thesis at the University of Poitiers. A work which should be completed in 2026. “Then, maybe another doctoral student will take over…” Not too frustrating? “We know that research work is like this. It’s making your contribution in a chain. »
He works on one of the most common blood cancers
His will have allowed quite a breakthrough. This is also what its place in the selection of the 2024 young researcher prize honors. Poitevin Julien Barthélémy is one of the five finalists. “There were around a hundred of us at the start”he explains under the eyes of his thesis director, Paule Seité from the cellular communication and tumor microenvironment (CoMeT) laboratory.
The young researcher is working on multiple myeloma, a cancer of the bone marrow “for which scientific advances are crucial to improve treatments”. In France, it concerns “six thousand new patients every year” and it is the “second most common cancer among blood cancers”. So much for context.
Julien Barthélémy's work focuses on “the role of a protein complex in the progression of multiple myeloma”. Did you understand something? Not sure… Behind the scientific jargon, we will be able to decipher that the innovation which allowed him to apply for this prize lies in “visualization of the carcinogenic cell”. By diverting several capture technologies, Julien managed to freeze the cell on photo “to understand the complex role of the three proteins”.
These tumor cells which proliferate “produce too many antibodies, cause bone breakdown and kidney damage”. It is to find a way to prevent this progression that the young academic continues his research.
But, moreover, how do we come to be interested in plasma cells, these cells actively secreting antibodies? Paule Seité, professor of biochemistry-molecular biology, explains: “We have been working on the subject for five years in conjunction with the Poitiers University Hospital. As is often the case in research, it was a bit by chance that, out of twenty-five patients suffering from multiple myeloma, we identified this complex of three proteins. »
The search continues “on 3D minitumors” on which will be tested “molecules inhibiting the complex”before the tests “on the little animal”. Before that, on December 6, 2024, Julien Barthélémy will know if he has won the 2024 young researcher prize. A way to highlight his work and the university's CoMeT laboratory.
