À propos
Since 2019, I have held a position as tenure researcher in Neuroscience at the National Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm, France). I hold a Doctor of Pharmacy degree (PharmD, 2004), a PhD in gastrointestinal pathophysiology (2007), and a specialization in pharmacology (2011).
Following the completion of my doctoral studies, I was recruited to join the laboratory of Prof. Pieter Vanden Berghe at KU Leuven (Belgium), as a post-doctoral fellow from 2010 to 2018 (FWP postdoctoral fellowship - own funding).
Throughout my academic career, I have specialized in the study of the enteric nervous system, particularly enteric glial cells and their role in gastrointestinal physiology and pathophysiology, in humans. I have established a protocol to obtain primary cultures of human enteric glial cells (Cirillo et al., 2011), and I have experience in neural cell cultures, genetic approaches (gene targeting, creation of genetically modified mouse models), imaging techniques, as well as ex vivo and in vivo functional analyses.
Bringing together these skills, I established my research project at Inserm, aiming at developing new therapeutic strategies to treat neuropathological loss, both in the central and peripheral nervous systems, using adult enteric glia as cell source. In a recent study as scientific responsible (PI), I have tested this hypothesis for brain tissue regeneration, in a model of acute injury (Adv Sci., 2026).
During these years, I have gained further international experience through a visiting professorship - two years - in the laboratory of Prof. Hideki Enomoto at Kobe University (Japan; 2021- 2024), and a further knowledge exchange period with the team of Prof. Werend Boesmans at Hasselt University (Belgium) in 2025.
Drawing on my interest in the enteric nervous system, I seek to use the same strategy to rescue neuronal loss in the periphery. Taking advantages of my connections with the active European scientific community in this field, in October 2025 I joined the Institute Imagine in Paris (team Amiel, "Genetics of developmental disorders").
Projet scientifique
My scientific projects aim at understanding the neurobiology of (human) enteric glial cells in health and disease, with a specific focus on the neurogenic – and regenerative – potential of this fascinating cell population. I employ animal models (rodents and non-human primates) of neuronal loss in the central nervous system or the enteric nervous system to test the research hypothesis. To this aim, national (CNRS, Toulouse; INSERM, Montpellier) and international (UHasselt, Belgium) collaborations are established.
