Microfluidics · Soft matter · Biophysics · Immunology
Droplets, interfaces and cells: microfluidics for quantitative biology
I am an Associate Professor in Chemistry at Sorbonne Université and lead the MesoBioLab team at the CPCV laboratory (ENS-PSL) and the Institut Pierre-Gilles de Gennes in Paris.
Research axes
Functional droplets and particles as biological tools
Emulsion droplets and microparticles with controlled size, softness and surface chemistry, used as artificial targets to measure how immune cells sense, engulf and process what they meet.
02Microfluidic platforms for quantitative cell biology
Trap arrays, droplet–cell pairing and reconstituted membrane systems that turn single-cell and single-vesicle observations into statistics.
03Microfluidics for plant and environmental biology
From the spatio-temporal study of moss development and microalgae phenotyping to the dynamics of hydrocarbon-degrading bacterial biofilms at oil–water interfaces.
News
- Héloïse Uhl joins the team as a postdoctoral researcher after her PhD with us, to work on force mapping during phagocytosis.
- Ratiometric pH-responsive biomimetic microparticles to monitor phagosomal acidification, published in Chemistry – A European Journal.
- Two MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowship projects on lipid digestion and lipolysis are open with Sorbonne Université — see open positions.
- A fully automated microfluidic setup to trap, analyse and release particles, by Alexandre Chargueraud, published in Micro and Nano Engineering.
About the lab
We design microfluidic platforms and engineered soft-matter objects — functional emulsion droplets, degradable microcapsules, surface-functionalised particles — and use them as quantitative tools for biology. Controlling interface chemistry, mechanics and confinement at the microscale lets us ask precise questions about how immune cells sense and engulf targets, how single cells and microalgae behave under controlled conditions, and how plants and bacterial biofilms develop.
The team is hosted at the Institut Pierre-Gilles de Gennes, a dedicated microfluidics institute with shared clean-room and microscopy facilities, and is part of the CPCV laboratory (ENS-PSL, Sorbonne Université, CNRS). I also direct the Microfluidics and Miniaturization Master and co-founded Quintessence Biotech.
Work with us
Students & postdocs
Internships, PhD and postdoctoral projects, MSCA fellowship hosting. See current openings and how to apply.
Open positions →Collaborators & funders
Droplet microfluidics, interface chemistry and quantitative imaging for immunology, cell and plant biology.
Publications →Industry & training
Tailored microfluidics training for R&D teams, and technology transfer through Quintessence Biotech.
Training →Latest publications
- Targeted fluorescent lipid microparticles for quantitative measurement of phagosomal pH Chemistry – A European Journal e71237 (2026)
- Fully integrated automatic microfluidic setup for immobilization, analysis and non-selective release of particles Micro and Nano Engineering In Press (2025)
- A microfluidic platform for actin-based membrane remodeling reveals the stabilizing role of branched actin networks on lipid microdomains Small Science 2500210 (2025)