Catherine Dulac wins $ 3 million for discovering the neurons of parental instinct

This Thursday, September 10, the French neurobiologist and professor, Catherine Dulac received an American scientific prize endowed with three million dollars, the Breakthrough Prize. A reward for his discovery of the parental instinct in the mouse brain.

A breakthrough that will help to better understand the roles adopted by mammals, including men and women! This Thursday, September 10, the 2021 winners of the "Breakthrought", created by entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, have won awards in several fields including life science, fundamental physics and mathematics. This year, six of them received $ 3 million each for their extensive work on neural circuits in the brain.

A professor and laboratory director at Harvard and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Catherine Dulac has been honored for identifying the neural circuits in the brain that dictate behavior in mice. In females, they generally take care of the mice while males tend to attack, depending on the circumstances.

A major discovery that shows that males and females each have in them, the behavioral circuits of both sexes, the only difference, their hormones activate one or the other circuit, like a switch. But depending on the situation, the other circuit is activated, "For example leading a stressed mother to kill her young or, even more spectacularly, a male to take care of his offspring when he becomes a father", indicates science and future.
"We believe that what we found may extend to other species" including humans, tells Catherine Dulac, 57 years old to AFP. "There is an instinct, and instinct is precisely the functioning of these neurons, which are – I bet – in the brains of all mammals and tell the animal, when there are signals on the presence of newborns: + You have to take care of them + ", continues the scientist.

A breakthrough for transgender people

Through her research, although limited to the mouse, Catherine Dulac advances researchers working on transgender issues. “In each, male and female wiring exists (at least in mice!) (…) "I am a scientist, I look at the data, I am neutral", she says. "It touches me a lot, there we say to ourselves: I was useful".

A committed woman, she says that she will give part of her prize to causes related to health, women's education and disadvantaged populations. Originally from Montpellier, she left for the United States after her doctorate at Normale Supp, with the firm intention of returning to France. "But my post-doc worked very well, and I had opportunities to have my own lab in the United States, and I had no opportunity to have my own lab in France. There I really got down to it. hit with a kind of paternalistic behavior to the con, if I can put it this way, where people said: + Oh you are much too young to have your own budget, you do not have enough experience to be independent + " .

Finally, Catherine Dulac chose Harvard. After obtaining dual citizenship, she moved to the United States. It continues to bring many advances in the scientific field.

It's scientifically proven, there is a "favorite child"

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