Thierry Naas

Thierry Naas serves as a Lecturer at Université Paris-Saclay and a hospital practitioner at Bicêtre Hospital. Based in the Immunology of Viral, Auto-immune, Hematological and Bacterial Diseases laboratory (IMVA-HB), he directs the Emerging Resistance to Antibiotics (RESIST) team, focusing on curbing the spread of antibiotic resistance in the human digestive tract.

Naas's primary research interests include Antibiotic Resistance, Bacterial Genetics, and Molecular Biology. His work centers on understanding how bacteria develop resistance through DNA mobility mechanisms, with particular emphasis on carbapenem resistance. He has developed diagnostic tools like the NG-Test CARBA 5 to detect carbapenemases, which has become the benchmark test in over 70 countries. His research has contributed to France maintaining less than 1% of enterobacteria strains resistant to carbapenem antibiotics, compared to 30-70% in some European neighbors.

At Bicêtre Hospital, Naas co-directs the National Reference Centre for Antibiotic Resistance to Carbapenems. His multidisciplinary approach bridges clinical practice and academic research, creating a virtuous circle where clinical observations inform laboratory work, which in turn improves patient care. The RESIST team, housed in the Faculty of Medicine Paris-Saclay at Kremlin-Bicêtre, conducts both fundamental research on bacterial enzymes and epidemiological analyses of resistance spread.

Naas completed his engineering degree and DEA at the École supérieure de biotechnologie de Strasbourg, followed by doctoral work at the University of Basel in Werner Arber's laboratory (Nobel Prize winner in Medicine, 1978). In 1997, he joined Université Paris-Sud (now Paris-Saclay) as a lecturer/hospital practitioner. His career demonstrates a consistent focus on understanding bacterial adaptation mechanisms and developing practical solutions to combat antibiotic resistance.