Damien COURTINE

Damien COURTINE is a Staff Scientist and Bioinformatician at the Microorganisms: Genome and Environment Laboratory (LMGE) at Clermont Auvergne University, where he has held a permanent position since December 2021. His work spans two research teams (MEB and IHP), focusing on bioinformatics analysis of microbial communities and genome analysis.

Dr. COURTINE earned his PhD in Microbiology from the University of Western Brittany (2017), an MSc in Bioinformatics from Blaise Pascal University (2014), a BSc in Biology (2012), and a Technical Diploma in Biology laboratory technician work (2011). Prior to his current position, he was a Post-doctoral Fellow at the Center d'Immunologie de Marseille-Luminy (2019-2021).

His research interests include bioinformatics, genomics, microbial ecology, metagenomics, and comparative genomics. Dr. COURTINE specializes in analyzing high-throughput sequencing data from microbial communities, developing genome analysis tools, and providing technical support related to sequencing methods. He works extensively with metagenomic, metatranscriptomic, and metabarcoding approaches, particularly focused on lake microorganism communities in Lake Pavin.

Dr. COURTINE's publication record demonstrates expertise in microbial ecology, particularly in extremophiles, microbial eukaryotes, and bacterial communities in meromictic lakes. His work often involves comparative genomics of archaea (particularly Thermococcales), metagenomic analysis of freshwater ecosystems, and development of bioinformatics tools. Recent publications span from 2021-2025, showing consistent productivity across multiple high-impact journals.

Since 2024, Dr. COURTINE has been teaching in the bioinformatics master's course at the University of Clermont Auvergne, where he instructs students in algorithms for short-read alignments using Python and the Burrow-Wheeler transform method.

His technical expertise includes Linux, high-performance computing (SLURM), version control with git, SnakeMake pipelines, Docker/Singularity containers, and programming in Python, R, and BASH.