In this final episode of the season two, Jennifer Baker meets Dr Martine Caroff a French scientist, mentor and entrepreneur who founded two equally impressive biotech businesses. Her first, LPS-BioSciences, built on her doctoral studies in bacterial endotoxins and later applied them to vaccines, diagnostic, cosmetics, and medical devices. A later venture, Hephaistos-Pharma, develops immunotherapy for cancer treatments. Her passion and drive was recognised when she took home the EU’s 2019 Women Innovator Prize. Martine was also a director at the prestigious CNRS, Paris-Saclay University campus.

Left unchecked, the number of people newly diagnosed with cancer every year in Europe will increase from the current 3.5 to over 4.3 million by 2035. Only 10% of patients are completely cured with immunotherapies; clinicians need innovative “immuno-stimulators” to improve patient’s ability to fight the cancer.

Hephaistos has a pre-clinical drug, called ONCO-boost, which triggers a patient’s body to recruit and prepare cancer-fighting cells (i.e. T-cells and macrophages), while helping the immune defenses better identify and destroy tumour cells. This sort of work is important as the EU rolls out its EU Mission on Cancer through better prevention, diagnosis, cures and aftercare with the aim of saving 3 million more lives by 2030. This includes the need for better infrastructure, facilities and funding, and greater “health equity” across member states, as well as a focus on childhood cancer to “cure more” but also to “cure better”.

Find out more:

· Watch Martin Caroff’s video for Women Innovators Prize

· Discover more on the EU Mission on Cancer

· Read about Martin Caroff’s businesses, LPS-BioSciences / Hephaistos-Pharma

· EU-backed project INNO-BOOST

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In the fifth episode of season two, journalist Jennifer Baker talks to the Austrian organic farmer and entrepreneur Alfred Grand who today is a member of several high-level EU and national actions for improving agri-businesses and soil health. From dreaming of racing motorbikes to producing wine, he started the ‘Lower Austrian Worm Composting System for Schools and Kindergartens’ to raise awareness of natural fertilising, which garnered a UNESCO prize. His businesses and career as a “rare worm breeder” (and advocate) blossomed from there. Alfred is also member of the Board of the EU Mission ‘A Soil Deal for Europe”.

Soils are the basis of 95% of our food and provide other essential ecosystem services such as clean water, biodiversity and climate regulation. Yet 60-70% of soils in the EU are in a poor state, and about 70% of agricultural land shows excess levels of nutrients affecting water quality and biodiversity.

Sustainable land management practices that safeguard soils are vital to a healthy planet and people. Alfred’s business venture, Vermigrand Naturprodukte, produces his branded ‘Biohumus’ fertiliser and peat-free soil substrates with the help of humble worms. He also runs a 90-hectare research pilot project (Grand Farm) to demonstrate sustainable soil health, agroforestry and market gardening practices. The farm is one of a dozen in the Dutch-led Global Lighthouse Farming Network for future-proof farming systems.

Find out more:

· Read more on the EU Mission A Soil Deal for Europe

· Learn about Vermigrand’s ‘hot rotting’ earthworm composting

· Read about the Global Lighthouse Farming Network

· Take a virtual visit of Grand Farm

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Join us for the fourth episode of Behind the Scenes’ second season and hear why our guest, Ann Runnel from Estonia, created Reverse Resources (RR), a business for tracking and trading textile waste across the whole supply chain. RR’s pioneering approach earned it the 2016 Global Change Award. Ann has also been a member of the Board of the EU Mission "Adaptation to Climate Change".

Ann tells our journalist Jennifer Baker that her interest in textiles was never about the aesthetics or fashion side, but more focused on textile waste, how clothes are produced, and how to improve material flows and achieve a more efficient circular economy – a closed-loop economic model that keeps valuable natural resources in productive use longer. Her business does this by lowering the cost of textile-to-textile recycling.

With her background in economics and eco-innovation, Ann is driven by the quest to run a profitable and efficient circular business globally. Prior to setting up RR, she investigated the impacts of environmental taxes on economic competitiveness in Estonia (TalTech), and helped to implement industrial upcycling for textile waste in Bangladesh (Aus Design).

Find out more:

· Discover more about Reverse Resources

· Visit the webpage on Adaptation to Climate Change EU Mission

· Read the Horizon Magazine monthly focus ‘The future of fashion is circular’

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