Deux lauréats du Human Frontier Science Program 2026

What does an eye do before it sees? While developing, the eye is surrounded by other structures that will build and shape our heads and faces. This complex process involves the coordination between different types of cells and tissues, such as bones, muscles, and complex sensory systems. All these need to fit together in the correct places, at the correct time. Thus, we propose that the developing eye is a key regulator of this process, coordinating the development of its neighbors. To study this, we focus on the interaction between the eye and the neural crest cells. These cells are critical to the formation of the head and face. But neural crest cells are born far away from the developing face, so they must walk a long path to perform their duties. If they fail to migrate, severe defects appear in our heads. Within their migratory route, neural crest cells pass by and interact with the eye, and if the eyes are not present, defects in the head appear. Building from these facts, we reached our hypothesis that the developing eye, before it starts seeing, guides the neural crest cells towards their correct place and to the right fate. But how? While developing, the eye broadcasts chemical and electrical signals to surrounding cells. We will start by studying whether and how these biochemical and bioelectric signals are capable of steering neural crest cell migration and differentiation by using a combination of tools from the cell and developmental biology fields as well as from experimental and theoretical physics. Instructed by theoretical models, we will also build eye-like cell spheres that will be equipped with light-controlled biochemical and bioelectric components. These structures will allow us to study how cells integrate chemical and electrical cues. The scientific impact of this highly interdisciplinary project is quite exciting, as it goes beyond eye-neural crest cell interactions and will reveal how cells integrate multiple, often contradictory, cues to move and differentiate in the complex environment of developing embryos. Broadly, understanding how our developing organs interact with each other during development will help us to better understand, control, and engineer developmental processes. In the long term, this will enable the design of preventive and reparative therapies targeting embryonic malformations.

How did animals first begin to sense and respond to the world around them? To explore this question, we are studying a family of proteins called TRP channels: molecular sensors that allow cells to detect heat, pressure, acidity, and chemical signals. In humans and other animals, TRP channels help us feel pain, regulate body temperature, and maintain internal balance. Yet we still know little about how these proteins first evolved or what roles they played in the earliest animals. Our project investigates the origins of these TRP channels by focusing on species that branched off early in animal evolution, including organisms such as the jellyfish Clytia hemisphaerica, and single-celled organisms called choanoflagellates, the closest living relatives of animals. These species are ideal for discovery: they represent evolutionary stages before the appearance of complex nervous systems, yet still perform sophisticated behaviours such as swimming, feeding, and responding to changes in their environment. We will begin by comparing TRP genes across a wide range of organisms to reconstruct their evolutionary history and trace how different types of channels emerged. We will then use high-throughput molecular tests to see how TRP channels from cnidarians and choanoflagellates respond to temperature, chemicals, and mechanical forces. Finally, we will connect these molecular findings to real behaviours in jellyfish larvae and choanoflagellates using modern genetic tools and live imaging. By uncovering how TRP channels worked in the earliest animals and their relatives, this research will reveal how the building blocks of sensation and communication evolved long before the first brains or nerves appeared. In doing so, we aim to illuminate the transition from single cells sensing their surroundings to the complex sensory systems that support life today.