Genopole and research laboratories

Hackathon D4Gen 2024: 48 hours of innovation for life

On 22–24 March, Genopole united close to 100 participants at Onepoint Paris for the third edition of D4Gen Hackathon, organized with the help of Amazon Web Services (AWS). During the non-stop, 48-hour event, researchers, students and start-uppers merged their know-how to take on technological challenges in health and the environment.

The event counted 12 participating teams, all focused on the shared objective of imagining concrete and sustainable solutions for issues in life sciences. Collective intelligence and scientific emulation were the motors of this marathon of ideas—and the marathon of ideas a springboard for innovation.

Ambitious projects and an expert jury

The jury, composed of eight experts from academics and entrepreneurship, appreciated the quality and audacity of the proposed projects.

Six teams took home prizes:

First Prize: MnemoGemonics (University of Lausanne) for its human genome analysis application built upon large language model technology. "Our project involves applying the same technology underlying ChatGPT to DNA and genomics. We are very happy to have been chosen as a laureate and we greatly appreciated the team approach over the 48 hours of non-stop work in this good-natured atmosphere," explains Gaël Millot.
Second Prize: BioMiMic (AgroParisTech) for its AI aimed at sustainable bioactive compound discovery.
Third Prize: ARN3D (bYoRNA) for its optimization of protein-RNA binding.

Three Jury's Favorite prizes were also awarded to the projects XylSevo, HydrographiX and I-Research, all forwarding promising and engaged innovations.

A catalyzing event

Beyond being a fun and productive competition, D4Gen Hackathon is also a training experience for the participants, who get to work on real-world issues, confront the imperatives of innovation, benefit from mentoring and build bridges between academics and entrepreneurship.

2024 jury: Nazim Agoulmine, Kenza Belhaj, Nesma Houmami, Christophe Lanneau, Christelle Monville, Vanessa Proux, Daniel Stockholm, Gilles Trystram.

≃100

participants for the third edition of D4Gen Hackathon.

teams awarded.