Danièle Werck-Reichhart

After an initial training in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Danièle Werck is awarded a PhD in 1978 and an Habilitation in 1985, in Molecular Biology with a Plant Biology orientation, at the University Louis Pasteur of Strasbourg. A industrial post-doct on herbicides metabolism (Roussel-Uclaf) is followed by a recruitment by CNRS in 1980 in the CNRS UA1182 headed by the Pr. H. Duranton. Her CNRS carrier is interrupted by two sabbaticals, one at University of Bristol in the laboratory of the Pr. O.T.G. Jones working on heme biosynthesis in 1985, and a second at the Carnegie Institute of Stanford in the laboratory of the Pr. Chris Somerville for an initiation to Arabidopsis genomics in 1999. Since 2005, Danièle Werck is CNRS Research Director, heading the « Plant Cytochromes P450 » group and the department « Plant Metabolic Networks » of the Institute of Plant Molecular Biology of CNRS. Due to her work on cytochrome P450 enzymes and on their roles in plant metabolism (bioynthesis of biopolymers, biosynthesis of aromatic terpenoids and of molecules with therapeutic applications, metabolism of herbicides) she became a major actor in these fields.

As part of her Fellowship, Danièle Werck-Reichhart is working on Evolution of the plant phenolic metabolism: a search for new strategies to improve biofuel production, together with her collaborator Ralf Reski.