As part of its interdisciplinary research carried out at the l’Institut Universitaire Mer et Littoral (University Institute for the Sea and Coast), the University of Nantes has just installed Biocolmar, a station to measure physico-chemical, marine growth, corrosion and fatigue at “Basse Michaud”.
The first of its kind in the world this station stems from a patent filed by the University of Nantes in 2013, followed by design validation by SATT Ouest Valorisation. It was financed within the SURFFEOL project managed by STX and runs alongside the COSELMAR project (Nantes University and IFREMER), two projects co-financed by the Pays de la Loire region.
Capacities SAS (coordination of operations), LeCamus (manufacturing), Atlantique Scaphandre (installation) and Bio-Littoral (biological expertise and offshore measurement) allowed development of this idea which was conceived 4 years ago as a result of 20 years of work on marine growth at the University of Nantes. The partners of this project are STX France Solutions, Bureau Veritas, Bio-Littoral, Nantes University (MMS and GeM laboratories) and IFSTTAR, which will participate in the exploitation of results, in particular on degradation processes and sensors at sea.
