Interdisciplinarity

This project is at the interface between developmental biology, neuroscience, and tissue mechanics. The objective is to bridge the gap between tissue mechanics and cell fate specification in the context of the vertebrate central nervous system morphogenesis.

To that end, we plan to use state-of-the-art image analysis techniques, Bayesian inference to infer cellular forces, K-means clustering, and single cell transcriptomics. We anticipate that this highly interdisciplinary combination of approaches will provide unparalleled insights into the mechanisms that relate the physical state of the tissue to its genetic patterning.

The candidate will be co-supervised by a biologist (Mehdi Saadaoui) and a physicist (Raphaël Clément), both localized in different teams of the Institute of Developmental Biology of Marseille (IBDM). He/she will share the time between the two labs.

In the biology lab, the candidate will carry out experiments and data analysis.

In the modeling lab, he/she will develop the pipeline to combine morphometric and mechanical data to perform K-means clustering, and eventually compare it to genetic data obtained in his/her experiments. If time allows, and if the data justifies it, the candidate may participate in the development of a dynamic model relating tissue patterning to its physical state.