How has bacterial immunity shaped immune systems across domains of life ?
Our work stems from the recent realization that bacteria possess a far more diverse repertoire of immune mechanisms than previously imagined, including homologs of eukaryotic immune genes.This diversity and conservation challenge the notion that immunity is organized differently across life forms and instead suggests shared logic between bacterial and eukaryotic immunity.
What are the fundamental principles that govern immunity across life? How do immune systems function at the molecular level, evolve, and how can understanding them lead to new therapies? These questions drive our research. We study immunity not only for its biomedical relevance—such as predicting immune targets or discovering new antiviral molecules—but also for its role in ecology evolution.
With our team, we aim to systematically chart the diversity and function of bacterial immune systems, uncover their evolutionary links to eukaryotic immunity—and harness them to identify novel immune genes across fungi, plant, algae and humans. This cross-domain perspective, termed ancestral immunity, provides a framework to explore what is conserved, what innovates, and how immunity can be both ancient and adaptable.
We employ a wide range of disciplines mixing bioinformatics and experimental approaches including (but not limited to) genomics, phylogenetics, bacterial genetics, phage biology … We analyze thousands of genomes from all living organisms and work primarly in the lab on two bacterial species Escherichia and Streptomyces.
We are a group of scientists currently working at Institut Pasteur fascinated by microbes and their diversity. Learn more about our team.
We are also passionate about diversity outside of microbes ! We think science should be more inclusive and shared outside of the scientific world. This is why we have many projects linking science and society summarized in the outreach part of the website.
