We Build Projects Together

One thing that I always did is, in my laboratory people came and we co-built a project together. I never imposed a project on anyone, but what we do is usually people came in the laboratory and they had some ideas, but then I always tell them don't commit to it, spend six months exploring, and for six months people just think about ideas, discuss, do some pilots, talk with me, and then we build the project. We build it because it's really grounded on their strength, on their passion, and on the strength of the lab. It's something that becomes really efficient and people leave with their project. Everyone left with their own project and started their own laboratory, so the vast majority of people that have come to my lab have their own laboratory today and they have taken all the data and the results and they start their own journey. So, I have worked in a very big field, but a lot of those fields actually have gone in many different directions very much because the projects have left with the people.

Inspire Young Scientists, Don’t Force Them

I have a theme of ideas [about where the research will go,] but how the project is going to develop or what the angle of it [will be] needs to be grounded in the passion of [the] people [in the lab]. You cannot direct scientists; [they are] like wild cats. You have to actually inspire them, maybe guide them a bit, but you have to tap into their strengths not into what you want from them. If you want to raise scientists, independent-minded people, you can't force them to do anything, so I believe very much in the ability of people to drive the project. I'm here as a guide to be able to co-build.

Yasmine Belkaid is a renowned scientist whose research focuses on the relationship between microbes and the immune system. She is the President as well as the head of the Metaorganism laboratory at the Institut Pasteur.

Belkaid earned her Master’s degree in biochemistry from the University of Science and Technology Houari Boumediene in Algiers, and a Master of Advanced Studies (DEA) from Paris-Sud University. In 1996, she earned her PhD in immunology from the Institut Pasteur, where she studied innate immune responses to leishmania infection. Belkaid then moved to the United States for a postdoctoral fellowship in intracellular parasite biology at NIAID’s Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases (NIH).

Belkaid has received numerous awards including the Robert Koch Prize, the Lurie Prize in Biomedical Sciences, the Sanofi-Institut Pasteur Prize, and the AAI Excellence in Mentoring Award. She also serves on the committees of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the National Academy of Sciences, the Microbiome Technical Advisory Group at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the NIH Anti-Racism Steering Committee, the American Society of Microbiology, and the Genentech Scientific Resource Board.