Prof. Yasmine Belkaid is the President of the Institut Pasteur (Paris) and the head of the Metaorganism laboratory at the Institut Pasteur.
She obtained her Master in Biochemistry at the University of Science and Technology Houari Boumediene in Algiers, Algeria and her PhD from the Institut Pasteur (Paris, France). Following a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, USA) on immune regulation during infection, she started her research program at the Children’s Hospital Research Foundation in Cincinnati. In 2005, she joined the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) where she served as department chair of the Laboratory of Host Immunity and Microbiome, Director of the trans-NIH Center for Human Immunology and founder and Director of the NIAID Microbiome program prior to joining the Institut Pasteur in 2024.
Her work explores fundamental mechanisms that regulate tissue homeostasis and host immune responses and uncovered key roles for the microbiota and dietary factors in the control of immunity and protection to pathogens. It also explores the role of the immune system in organismal remodeling and the impact of infections on the mother-child dyad.
Prof. Belkaid is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine and she is the recipient of numerous awards including the Lurie Prize in Biomedical Sciences, the Emil von Behring Prize, the Sanofi-Institut Pasteur Award, the Robert Koch Award and the AAI Excellence in Mentoring Award.