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Animated by a desire to help the most disadvantaged, Father Pedro Opeka, a Lazarist priest, devotes his life to improving the living conditions of Madagascar's marginalized populations. His strong humanitarian commitment has resulted in the creation of Akamasoa, an association that provides shelter, education and healthcare to thousands of Malagasy people. By transforming the lives of an entire community in this way, he has become a symbol of hope in a country beset by poverty.

At the University of Namur, the MyCoach scheme offers invaluable help to support students in their academic career in the sciences. Spearheaded by the Faculty through Aurélie Tacheny, this project, initiated a year ago, aims to boost student success and perseverance by integrating a personalized support approach. The scheme, which is now being assessed, is based on regular meetings and individual follow-up (four key meetings with students, at strategic moments in the academic year).

This is a fine reward for Professor André Füzfa, astrophysicist in the Department of Mathematics and head of the Astronomical Observatory at UNamur. On November 21, he received the "Coup de Coeur" award from the Trophées de Matière Grise, RTBF's popular science program 2024. These trophies aim to reward the country's scientists, who mobilize to disseminate their knowledge and insights to the general public.

The Blended Intensive Programme (BIP) is an innovative course format promoted and financed by Erasmus+ funds to promote international mobility and pedagogical innovation. This type of program, combining a virtual component with short-term physical mobility (minimum 5 days), enables teachers and students to explore new teaching and learning methods while gaining international experience. At the University of Namur, the Summer School in Molecular Microbiology, organized from July 1 to 5, 2024, in the form of a BIP, is a successful example.

How does a river work? How do river overflows occur? What can be done to protect our territories from these risks? At UNamur, geography students followed an innovative teaching activity, using a 3D augmented reality sandbox, to learn about this issue. What are the aims of this tool? Simulate and analyze natural phenomena. A unique and immersive experience to better understand environmental dynamics and climate risks, carried out in collaboration with the non-profit organization Contrat de Rivière Ourthe.

Located in the Indian Ocean, Madagascar is an island with a rich natural heritage and multiple cultural influences. For over 15 years, researchers from the University of Namur have been working with a number of Madagascan universities and institutes on a variety of themes, including environmental preservation, water management and institutional capacity building. Focus on some of these projects.

In late November, the Mont-Saint-Guibert-based company Cellistic® donated equipment it no longer used to UNamur. By enabling the university to give this equipment a second life, Cellistic is making an important gesture in support of the development of university research.

Maxime Lucas is an FNRS Research Fellow in the Department of Mathematics and a member of the naXys Institute. He works on complex systems within the "Network Dynamics" cluster headed by Professor Timoteo Carletti. He is co-author of two papers on complex systems, recently published in prestigious journals Nature Physics and Physical Reviews Letters.

The Covid-19 pandemic is a human tragedy that has caused millions of deaths worldwide and put our entire society under great strain. But it has also been a tremendous collective moment for many UNamur scientists, whose research continues in an attempt to better understand this disease and its consequences.

The three Belgian scientific experiments selected to be carried out on board the International Space Station (ISS) during astronaut Raphaël Liégeois' mission in 2026 have just been unveiled by the Federal Science Policy Public Service (Belspo). One of them is carried by a team from UNamur for an experiment at the crossroads of biology and physics aimed at analyzing the resistance of the "blob", an atypical unicellular organism.

Beautiful victory for Margaux Mignolet, a researcher at the Faculty of Medicine's Unité de Recherche en Physiologie Moléculaire (URPhyM), who wins 1st prize in the Belgian inter-university final of the Ma thèse en 180 secondes (MT180) competition. Her research? To better understand the mechanisms of antibodies active in cases of long COVID. The second prize in this national competition was also won by a candidate from Namur. It was Petra Manja, from the Unité de Recherche en biologie des micro-organismes (URBM), Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, and is pursuing a thesis aimed at understanding resistance mechanisms in the bacterium E. coli. Both are also researchers at the NARILIS Institute.