Biomae

BIOMAE, founded in 2014, is a French company specializing in biosurveillance of water quality and aquatic environments. The company utilizes gammarus, a freshwater crustacean, to detect the presence of micropollutants and evaluate their ecotoxic effects in water bodies. BIOMAE's core technology involves caging and exposing gammarus directly to micropollutants in the aquatic environment, followed by bioaccumulation and ecotoxicity analyses. This innovative approach allows for the assessment of chemical contamination and toxic effects of pollutants present in or discharged into aquatic environments. The company's bioassays are standardized by AFNOR, with its bioaccumulation test on caged gammarus being used by all six French water agencies for monitoring priority substances under the Water Framework Directive (WFD). BIOMAE offers solutions for both water quality surveillance and impact studies on natural environments or receiving waters. In March 2019, the company's robust protocol for in-situ caging of gammarus was standardized by an AFNOR commission. As of 2021, BIOMAE joined the French CARSO group, a leader in analytical services for water, environment, and food industries.

Key customers and partnerships

BIOMAE's key customers include water agencies, with the company implementing over 250 measuring stations and conducting 700 analyses annually for WFD Biota monitoring in France. The company also serves industrial clients such as SANOFI and EDF for impact studies. BIOMAE has partnerships with scientific institutions, including INRAE (formerly IRSTEA), with whom they co-constructed reference systems for result interpretation. In September 2020, BIOMAE played a crucial role in creating "France Eau Biosurveillance," an association of water and aquatic environment biosurveillance actors, which includes major companies like Suez, Veolia, Aquabio, Eurofins, and Carso. This initiative, supported by the French Ministry of Ecological Transition and the Ministry of Economy, aims to establish biosurveillance tools in regulatory monitoring and develop a certification process for these tools.