In conventional agriculture, plant protection products (PPP) are authorized to regulate pests and parasites impacts and optimize yields. The use of these control products is supervised and regulated by the Marketing Authorizations issued by ANSES, in France, and controlled by EFSA across the European Union. The regulation notably provides for verifying the environmental impact of PPPs, in particular on aquatic ecosystems. Aquatic toxicity is generally assessed by performing experimental tests following methods proposed by OECD guidelines (section 2). However, these tests can be time consuming and expensive. In order to help the chemical industry to limit animal experimentation according to the 3R principle (Replace - Reduce - Refine), KREATiS offers in silico methods which are alternatives to laboratory tests. The goal of KREATiS is to develop validated predictive models at least as accurate as experimental tests considered as reliable.

Description:

This project aims to investigate aquatic toxicity (acute & chronic) of chemicals used as pesticides (like fongicides) in crop protection. The three environmental trophic levels of interest will be:

• algae,
• crustaceans Daphnia magna (invertebrates),
• fish (vertebrates).

In a first time, you will collect ecotox and physchem data. You will be in charge of the reliability assessment of these data following the OECD guidelines and the Klimisch score. These data will be collected within an internal database. Then, you will develop (Q)SAR predictive models by correlating aquatic toxicity and some structural properties. Finally, you will have to perform the statistical validation of the models prior to implementation in iSafeRat® desktop software.

During this project, you will work in a field of applied research to answer client requests from chemical & phytopharmaceutical industries.

Missions:

1. data search & assessment of physchem and aquatic toxicology studies
2. database management
3. understanding of toxic mechanisms of action (MechoA) of pesticides (i.e. fongicides)
4. development of predictive models in ecotoxicology & statistical validation

Knowledge & skills:

• Organic chemistry
• Biochemistry
• Ecotoxicology
• Mathematic, statistics and database
• English

If you are interested by this job offer, please send your resume and cover letter to pascal.bicherel@kreatis.eu