Download Eve DEVINOY, PhD, senior scientist

Eve DEVINOY, PhD, Senior Scientist
Research Unit Director , INRA-UR1196 Génomique et
Physiologie de la Lactation (GPL), Jouy-en-Josas, France
Eve Devinoy graduated from the Ecole Nationale
Agronomique (National Agronomics School) in Rennes in
1975 and from the Institut National Agronomique
(National Agronomics Institute) Paris Grignon in 1976.
She then trained for three years in the “Physiologie de la
Lactation” research unit under the supervision of L.M.
Houdebine, studying the control of rabbit milk protein
synthesis by glucocorticoids; she defended her PhD thesis in Biochemistry in 1978.
She joined INRA (French National Agricultural Research Institute) as a junior scientist in 1978.
In 1979 and 1980, she completed her training in the biochemistry and genetics of eukaryotic
Systems, in developmental biology and in membrane structure and function” and then spent
almost two years as a Visiting Fellow at NIH-NCI, in the laboratory headed by Dr P. Gullino.
Moving back to Paris, she started her work on milk protein genes with the help of Dr. J.A.
Lepesant, at the IRBM, Paris.
She returned to L.M. Houdebine's research unit at INRA, Jouy-en-Josas in 1981 to work on the
cloning of rabbit milk protein genes. She then identified a distal regulatory region in one
particular milk protein gene. When this distal region was linked to heterologous genes, it could
control the expression of foreign genes in the mammary gland during lactation. A patent was
therefore filed and is still being used by a private company, “BioProtein Technologies”.
At the end of 2000, she decided to create her own research group and moved to Dr J. Djiane's
laboratory to continue her favorite research program, on distal regulatory regions and chromatin
organization around milk protein genes. In parallel, she organized a PhD training course for the
Université de Versailles St Quentin en Yvelines-Evry Val d’Essonne on the control of eukaryotic
gene expression. This annual, one-week training course has been running ever since.
In 2003, her group joined the new research unit set up by Dr M. Ollivier-Bousquet on the
genomics and physiology of lactation. The team has two main projects. The first is to understand
the control of milk protein gene expression by lactogenic hormones through modification of the
chromatin structure and nuclear organization. The second is to unravel the mechanism underlying
the long term effects induced by obesity at puberty on mammary gland development and milk
production, and secondary effects on the growth of the next generation.
Since 2008, Eve Devinoy has been Director of the “Génomique et Physiologie de la Lactation”
Research Unit. Her involvement in the study of epigenetic modifications during normal
development of the mammary gland, and her long term collaboration with Dr M. Rijnkels
(CNRC-Baylor, Houston, USA) led her to be Guest Editor for a special issue of the Journal of
Mammary Gland Biology and Neoplasia in 2010.