Portrait of François, a new researcher in our laboratory

François Georges joined the IMN on January 1st (2016) and leads the team Dopamine and neuronal assemblies with Jerome Baufreton.

After his PhD at the University of Bordeaux in June 1999, he made a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, USA) in the laboratory of Professor Gary Aston-Jones and studied the regulation of dopaminergic neurons using in vivo electrophysiological approaches.

He was then recruited at CNRS in October 2002 and worked successively in three laboratories before joining IMN:

• 2002-2005: CNRS UMR 5541 headed by Pr. Bertrand Bloch (team of Catherine Le Moine)
• 2006-2010: CRI U862 headed by Dr. Pier-Vincenzo Piazza (team of Olivier Manzoni)
• 2011-2015: IINS CNRS UMR 5297 headed by Dr. Daniel Choquet (team of Laurent Groc)

These 14 years working at CNRS – and the three teams in which he had the opportunity to work – allowed him to enrich and advance his research project while keeping the same guideline: the study of neural circuits controlling dopamine neurons.

His main focus is now the mechanisms of in vivo synaptic plasticity in a neuronal network involved in motivation, stress and anxiety-related behaviors. He is mainly using in vivo electrophysiology, immunohistological and tract-tracing approaches.

When François is not in the laboratory, he’s a busy man, or at least an accomplished athlete with no less than 20 participations in various marathons.

Welcome among us!