Mikhail Shapiro Selected as Fulbright U.S. Scholar for France

Mikhail Shapiro, the Max Delbrück Professor of Chemical Engineering and Medical Engineering, has been awarded the Fulbright-Tocqueville Distinguished Chair Award by the Franco-American Fulbright Commission. The award will support Shapiro’s ongoing research and teaching at two institutions in France, ESPCI Paris – PSL and Inserm, during the 2024–25 academic year while he is on sabbatical from Caltech.

The distinguished chair award was created in 2005 by the Franco-American Fulbright Commission, the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research, and the US Department of State to commemorate the 200th birthday of French political theorist Alexis de Tocqueville and the 100th birthday of Senator J. William Fulbright. According to the Fulbright France website, “Grantees will teach courses at the postgraduate and doctoral level, undertake research, and help organize and participate in conferences and seminars related to their area of expertise.”

In his work, Shapiro, who is also an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, uses noninvasive techniques, such as ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), to image and control the behavior of cells deep inside the body. Recently, he has used air-filled gas vesicles derived from some species of cyanobacteria to help track the location of individual bacterial cells and to actually move cells into specific locations using ultrasound. This latter accomplishment shows promise for the creation of artificial tissues for research or medical purposes.

While in Paris, Shapiro plans to collaborate with Mickael Tanter, director of the Institute for Physics for Medicine at ESPCI Paris – PSL and research director at Inserm, who served as a Moore Distinguished Scholar at Caltech in 2022. “Mickael’s lab leads the world in ultrasound engineering,” says Shapiro. “We will work on combining their advances in super-resolution and neural imaging with our lab’s work connecting ultrasound to the function of specific cells.”

Shapiro is excited about working in France, which he says has the longest and strongest tradition in ultrasound. He is especially pleased about spending time at ESPCI, where giants such as Marie Curie, Pierre Curie, and Paul Langevin made some of the key discoveries that underlie much of modern biomedical imaging. He also hopes to practice his French, engage in cultural and scientific diplomacy, and “eat lots of delicious pastries.”

Mikhail Shapiro is an affiliated faculty member of the Tianqiao and Chrissy Chen Institute for Neuroscience. The Fulbright-Tocqueville Distinguished Chair Award is financed jointly by the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research and the Franco-American Fulbright Commission.