Dr. Pierre Marraccini is Visiting Scientist of CIRAD (UMR DIADE) specializing in coffee molecular physiology to work in the European Union (EU) GCCA+/DeSIRA III Project entitled “Robusta coffee agroforestry to adapt and mitigate climate change in Uganda” based at icipe Jinja and work in partnership at NaCORI station of Kitusa.

Dr. Marraccini got his Ph.D. in Plant Cellular and Molecular Biology at Paris-Orsay University on the light-regulation of gene expression. In 2008, he obtained the “Accreditation to supervise research” (HDR) entitled “Biology and molecular physiology of coffee bean development” from Paris-Orsay University.

He has previously worked with Nestlé (Plant Science Research Center Tours, France) as Researcher working on storage proteins and metabolism of complex polysaccharides during coffee bean development. Since 2001, he has been a researcher in coffee molecular physiology at CIRAD working in partnership in different coffee producing countries.

He has also worked at the Agronomic Institute of Parana state (IAPAR, Londrina - Brazil) to study sucrose and diterpen metabolism in developing coffee beans. From 2006 up to 2016, Pierre was localized at the CENARGEN (Center of Genetic Resources and Biotechnology, Brasilia - Brazil) of EMBRAPA where he worked to study the genetic determinism of drought tolerance in both Coffea arabica and C. canephora species.

From September 2017 to May 2021, he was hosted at the Agricultural Genetics Institute (AGI, Hanoi – Vietnam) in the framework of the BREEDCAFS (“BREEDing Coffee for AgroForestry Systems” project supported by EU (H2020 SFS-2016-2).

The results of his research work have been published in several articles published in international journals, and in international patents. Pierre is also member of the international Arabica Coffee Genome Consortium (ACGC) currently involved in the C. arabica genome sequencing.