The Institute Jacques Monod, funded jointly by the CNRS and the University Paris Diderot, is one of the main centers for basic research in
biology in Paris, France. It is headed by Giuseppe Baldacci, professor at the University of Paris Diderot. There are 3 broad research topics (Genome and
chromosome dynamics, Cellular dynamics and signaling, Development and evolution) and 2 main transverse axes (Quantitative
biology and modeling, Molecular and cellular pathologies). Research at the interface of
biology with physics, mathematics, chemistry and
medicine is strongly encouraged. Some 300 people work at the Institute (tenured investigators, Ph.D. students, post-docs, technicians, engineers, French and foreign visitors, and administrative staff).
The Institute de Biologie Moléculaire thus saw the day in 1966, and Raymond Dedonder was appointed as its first director. The managing committee comprised, in particular, Jacques Monod and François Jacob, who were to receive the Nobel Prize for Medicine, along with their colleague Andre Lwoff from the Institute Pasteur. The committee set the scientific guidelines that were to be developed around the main theme of
biochemistry of heredity the study of replication, protein biosynthesis, the mechanisms and control of transcription & translation in bacteria and in
cells of higher organisms, the mechanisms of differentiation, the study of conformation & conformational changes in biological macromolecules, the study of the functional associations of
macromolecules and the conformational problems that are posed by the supervision of these associations.
The Institute Jacques Monod also plays an active role in teaching. About fifty students of many different nationalities are presently preparing their doctoral theses at the Institute Jacques Monod, and another hundred or so pre- and post-graduate students are welcomed each year in the labs to help introduce them to the world of research. Many of the researchers also teach at the University, in accordance with the Institutes strong commitment to transmitting the concepts and techniques of quantitative and mechanistic
biology to university students. Several hundreds of scientists have been trained at the Institute or have spent extended periods of study there. Today they work in laboratories around the world and a number of them now head other important research units.
The research area covers on the institute is cell cycle,
DNA replication and repair, epigenetics, gene expression,
genome structure and evolution, mitosis-meiosis, viral replication, Cellular dynamics and signalling, cell cycle, cell migration, cell polarity, cytoskeleton, endocytosis exocytosis, mechano transduction, membrane and trafficking, mitosis-meiosis, morphogenesis, neurobiology,
RNA Signalling,
ubiquitin and ubi-like, Development and evolution, cell fate and differentiation, cell migration, cell polarity,
evolution germ cell, microevolution, morphogenesis, neurobiology, ovogenesis, stem cells,
tumorigenesis etc.
Last Updated on: Nov 25, 2024