Team members
Team leaders
Clément Léna (DR INSERM) • Contact Clément Léna
Daniela Popa (DR INSERM) • Contact Daniela Popa
Clément Léna graduated from Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS) in 1992, with master degrees in physics and in neurobiology. He obtained his PhD in Neuroscience and Pharmacology at University Pierre-et-Marie-Curie (Paris 6) in the laboratory of JP Changeux at the Pasteur Institute. He was then trained in massively parallel neuronal recordings in the laboratory of Matt Wilson at MIT. After being appointed as an INSERM researcher back in France, he studied the contribution of the central cholinergic and serotoninergic systems on sleep and emotional systems. In parallel he developped the study of network dynamics in the cerebellum and in associated structures. Clément Léna was appointed Research Director INSERM in 2013. Clément Léna has an HDR from the ENS; he is co-PI of the team Neurophysiolgy of Brain Circuits.
Clément Léna has been member of the national evaluation/recrutment committee of the CNRS (CoNRS section 25, Physiology), treasurer of the French Society of Neurosciences, first treasurer of the French Brain Council, member of board of directors of the ENS and is currently in the board of directors of the French College of Scholarly Societies. He is since 2016 director of the GDR NeuralNet which currently regroups more than 80 teams of integrative neurosciences.
Daniela Popa (MD PhD), got her MD at the medical university Carol Davila in Bucarest followed by a PhD in Pharmacology at the University Paris-Descartes in the laboratory of Michel Hamon. During her PhD she studied the links between serotonin and mood disorders using serotoninergic mutant rodents and animal models of depression. She received further training in neurophysiology in vivo in the laboratory of Denis Paré at Rutgers University (NJ) studying the mechanisms of fear and fear extinction. She moved to the Ecole Normale Superieure (ENS) in Paris in 2009 and was appointed there as an INSERM researcher. Her initial work focused on the characterization of cerebro-cerebellar networks, and she is now also actively involved in the study of this network in normal and pathological states. Daniela Popa has an HDR from the ENS; she is co-PI of the team Neurophysiolgy of Brain Circuits. Daniela is currently an appointed member of the National Comitee of the CNRS (section Neuroscience) and co-chair of the Gordon Conference on Cerebellum.
Permanent member
Guillaume Dugué (CR CNRS) • Contact Guillaume Dugué
Guillaume Dugue graduated from the Ecole Normale Superieure in 2002 with a master degree in Neurobiology. He obtained his PhD in 2006 at the Université Pierre et Marie Curie, under the direction of Stéphane Dieudonné (ENS) studying the cellular physiology of the cerebellum in vitro. He expanded his research to the field of integrated and systems neuroscience in the laboratory of Zach Mainen at the Champalimaud Institute, working on the serotoninergic neuromodulation using optogenetic approaches . He then joined Clément Léna at the ENS in 2012 to work on sensorimotor circuits and more recently in sensory processing in the vestibulo-cerebellum; he also studies the role of the vestibular system in scoliosis. Guillaume Dugue has been appointed as Researcher by the CNRS in 2017 and obtained his HDR from the Ecole Normale Supérieure in 2018. He is a permanent member of the team Neurophysiology of Brain Circuits.
Students/ Interns
Pimpimon Nondhalee Simon (Postdoc)
Sarah Fouda (Postdoc)
Roman Ursu (Postdoc)
Romain Sala (Postdoc)
Romain Fayat (PhD student)
Stefano Bettani (PhD student)
Julie Urrutia-Desmaison (PhD student)
Ahsan Ayyaz (PhD student)
Margarida Pinto (PhD student)
Marie Sarraudy (PhD student)
Inès Bouaziz (PhD student)
Marion d’Almeida (AI, Lab Manager)
Maria Añez Carmona (M2 student)