Insect pests can damage agricultural crops, consume and/or damage harvested food, in addition to diseases transition to humans and animals. Chemical insecticides and pesticides can affect human health directly or indirectly by disrupting ecological systems (air, rivers, lakes, oceans, streams, wetlands, forests and fields). At national and European levels, there is no regulation on the presence of pesticides in the air as it is the case for other pollutants typically. Since the early 1900s, Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) bacterium group has received great attention, alternative to chemical products, for its use as an insect pest control agent, due to the parasporal inclusion production. The morphology of these inclusions may vary among Bt strains as bipyramidal, cuboidal, amorphous, spherical and irregular crystal morphologies can be observed. Previously it was believed to be important to end up with high spore counts. It was later shown that the spore count can give a good estimate of the growth of Bt in fermentation, but it does not always reflect the fermentation yield in terms of insecticide production since the amount of crystal protein, the main active compound, per bacterial cell can vary. Evaluation of these Bt products can be performed classically using several types of analysis ranging from bioassays to diverse biochemical methods. The main disadvantages of these methods are their expensiveness and their time-consuming character. Hence, an alternative physical method based on light scattering has been developed in order to quantify inclusion body formation and growth in recombinant cells. We recently showed that polarized speckle imaging method can be used to distinguish between Bt spherical crystal size and concentration within different fermentation products. In this project, we intend to extend our optical characterization, towards a real-time monitoring of the chemical fermentation reaction. Instead of embedding crystals into agarose gel to get rid of the Brownian motion, aqueous suspensions of crystals and/or spores will be studied; the reference Bt strains (HD1 and HD133) as well as isolated strains from Lebanese and Tunisian soil samples will be used. This project paves the way for potentially using laser polarized speckle at an industrial scale as a low-cost and non-invasive technique in order to characterize crystal geometry and to evaluate the yield of crystal production within fermentation. To achieve the objectives, the project gathers together experts in physics, chemistry and biology from three Mediterranean countries: France (UBO), Lebanon (USJ) and Tunisia (CBS).

The motivation to develop a master program on “Global Supply Chain Management” is primarily driven by (1) the global trends in supply chain management; (2) its unique contribution to food security, maritime industry and humanitarian relief programs in the Middle East; (3) the institutional capacity of the partner universities to implement the proposed program and the European partners’ excellence in the field of supply chain management. With the increased use of digital technologies and the expanding scope of business operations, supply chain management stands at the forefront of the global economy, making national boundaries irrelevant and companies and countries ever closer. Supply chain management is particularly important in the Middle Eastern context as the region is heavily dependent on international trade for imports and exports and cultural issues play a major role in business practices. In such a highly competitive and globalized market environment, companies need well-educated supply chain management professionals who can easily understand cross-cultural issues and make supply chain decisions that have increasingly become less standardized, more complex, highly dynamic, and talent intensive. GLOB-SM will advance CBHE objectives of supporting modernization, accessibility and internationalization of higher education institutions by developing a highly demanded, technology intensive, and need based curriculum that is new for not only Lebanon and Jordan , but also the whole of Middle East and implementing innovative strategies and tools. Being the only program of its kind in the MENA Region, the program will not only contribute to enhancing the local and regional competences on the management of supply chain, but will also enhance the employability of graduates by providing an international standard high quality education in the field.

Mediterranean terrestrial ecosystems are facing increasing desertification because of the worsening of environmental pressures due to global change. The desertification processes lead to plant cover degradation, soil erosion, nutrient depletion and a decrease of microbial activity. The establishment of global political strategies aiming at a better management of terrestrial ecosystems is thus crucial for their conservation. In this context, Ceratonia siliqua L. (carob tree), a xerophilous tree adapted to Mediterranean climate, appears as a key model for afforestation/restoration programs because of its resistance and adaptation to extreme environmental conditions and its high socio-economic added value. Carob is a non-nodulated legume highly dependent of arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) symbiosis for its survival and productivity. Its biological nitrogen fixation status remains uncertain but AM fungi have been hypothesized as an "obligatory vector" of nitrogen-fixing endophytic bacteria into the carob intracellular compartment. The management of carob populations is therefore closely linked to a better understanding and use (ecological engineering strategies) of the symbiotic community associated with carob. The main hypothesis of DYNAMIC is that infra-specific plant evolutionary differentiation is a determinant, but overlooked, driver of the diversity and structure of the symbiotic community, optimizing symbiotic efficiency. However, the evolutionary history and genetic diversity structure of carob is mostly unknown at the Mediterranean scale. Geographical isolation, long term vicariance and selection for agriculture are expected to have caused extensive genetic and physiological modifications in carob, conducing to potential changes/adaptations of its associated symbiotic microbiome. The overall objective of DYNAMIC is to decipher the symbiotic network in Mediterranean carob-based (agro)ecosytems to develop innovative ecological strategies based on efficient symbiotic interactions. The project is tackling this issue by (i) revealing the evolutionary significant units and genetic structure of carob at the Mediterranean scale, (ii) characterizing the alpha and beta taxonomic and phylogenetic diversity of carob symbiotic microbiome, (iii) exploring the links between these genetic parameters and environmental data to determine symbiotic networks and their drivers (genetic x ecological) and finally by (iv) testing experimentally the results to optimize the host-symbiont efficiency in carob tree cultures. Field investigations will be done through the carob dissemination history (native and exotic areas) and in contrasting ecological contexts (shrublands, agroforestry systems, pure stands). The symbiotic networks will be characterized by combining high-throughput molecular approaches, bioinformatic analyses based on ecological network theory, and then applied to develop innovative ecological engineering strategies. The perspectives are a better understanding of plant-microbiome genetic relationships driving ecosystem functioning and the identification of a core and an accessory "SymbiOme" in carob populations. More generally, DYNAMIC should give new insights on the ecological drivers governing host-symbiont specificity and efficiency and should propose new avenues for the development of efficient ecological engineering strategies applied to ecosystem restoration and ecological intensification of (agro)ecosystems.

In Lebanon, student representation is, in most cases, based on traditional political divisions, themselves based on regional politics and influences. Students usually identify themselves as belonging to a certain political family, a choice depending mainly on deeply-rooted family habits and traditional affiliations. This situation therefore ignites frequent confrontations between groups of students during student elections and in-between. In some universities, student bodies and representation have consequently been suppressed, in order to avoid such problems and to remain politically neutral. As a consequence, students are provided with rare, or inexistent, opportunities to organize events, launch clubs and take responsibilities in their lives on campus and in their communities. However, student representation and engagement is an important aspect of campus life: it can teach young people the sense of responsibilities, foster new ideas for university development and engage students in local development. European universities and their developed and diverse systems of student representation bodies can be considered great role models and mentors in the development of these structures in Lebanese universities, given their experience and expertise on the matter. Actually, almost all Higher Education-related laws in Europe have incorporated students’ rights to organize. On the practical side, this right to organize mainly translates in a model of student representation “characterized by de-politicized student governments providing student services that complement the institutional quality agenda” (Klemencic, 2015). This project therefore aims at the empowerment of students and the creation of politically-neutral and democratic student representation bodies, as well as their engagement in their campus and social lives, with the support of European Universities.