Team of Abdou Rachid Thiam · Laboratoire de Physique de l'ENS, Paris
We explore how lipids and physical forces organize cellular membranes, shape organelles, and regulate their functions.
We combine cell biology, biophysics and soft-matter physics: we study organelles in living cells, and we rebuild them in vitro to measure the forces and lipid properties that control them.
How do lipids build and organize organelles?
Organelles are built from lipids, and their lipid composition sets their shape, size and identity. Using the ER and lipid droplets as main models, we study how neutral lipids gather between the ER leaflets, how droplets bud and grow, and how seipin guides these steps. We extend these questions to mitochondria, lysosomes and the contact sites that link organelles.
How do proteins sense and reshape lipid environments, and vice versa?
Proteins read lipid packing, composition and tension to decide where to bind; once bound, they remodel the membrane and the lipids it stores. We study this two-way dialogue with perilipins, amphipathic helices, ER membrane proteins, lipid transfer proteins such as ATG2, and the autophagy protein LC3.
How do physical forces control organelle behavior?
Membranes are soft materials: tension, curvature and lipid packing decide how organelles deform, bud and fuse. We measure these forces directly on model membranes and on giant vesicles made from organelles, and connect them to organelle behavior in cells.
Can we rebuild organelles to uncover the physics of life?
We come from emulsion physics. Droplet-embedded vesicles, artificial lipid droplets and droplet interface bilayers made in microfluidic chips let us rebuild organelle membranes with the composition we choose, and test which physical rules cells rely on.
Spotlight
We transform native cellular organelles into giant, experimentally accessible membrane systems. By preserving key features of their biological composition while enabling direct physical manipulation, these platforms allow us to measure membrane mechanics, investigate protein function, and reconstruct cellular processes under controlled conditions.
With our collaborators: lipidomics, structural biology and molecular dynamics simulations.
We welcome physicists, chemists and biologists for internships, PhDs and postdocs. Send a CV and a few lines on what interests you.
art@ens.fr
