Pierre Monsan (65) is Professor Emeritus at the National Institute for Applied Sciences of the University of Toulouse, and Professor at Mines ParisTech (Department of Biotechnology). He is Head of the Executive Board and Founder of the pre-industrial demonstrator “Toulouse White Biotechnology (TWB)”.

He has been active for 44 years in the field of enzyme catalysis (enzyme production, purification, immobilization and application, screening, structural characterization and molecular design). He authored more than 220 scientific publications, 2 books and 62 patents. His H-factor is 35.He was involved in the founding of several start-up companies: BioEurope (1984), BioTrade (1996), Genibio (1998) and in the move of LibraGen from Lyon to Toulouse (2004). He is a founding member of the French Academy of Technology, Deputy-chairman of the French Federation of Biotechnology, member of the Executive Board of the European Federation of Biotechnology and French representative at the Board of the International Carbohydrate Organization.