WHY DO EMBRYOS FRAGMENT, AND WHAT DOES IT MEAN? - Discussion

Thomas Ebner, PhD, graduated with honours from the Paris Lodron University of Salzburg, Austria, in 1992. Completing his doctorate and post-doctoral thesis, he became a university professor in Linz, Salzburg and Graz. He has published more than 160 papers and book chapters as first and co-author. Research interests include time-lapse imaging, non-invasive IVF selection processes, andrology, vitrification and culture media. He was certified as a senior clinical embryologist by ESHRE in 2008 and re-certified in 2012. He was EC Board Member ESHRE and of ALPHA – Scientists in Reproductive Medicine. .

Jean-Léon Maître leads the team Mechanics of mammalian development at the Institut Curie since 2016. Jean-Léon Maître completed his PhD work on the mechanics of cell adhesion during zebrafish gastrulation with Prof Carl-Philipp Heisenberg at the Max Planck Institute for Cell Biology in Dresden and Genetics and then at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria In Klosterneuburg. He then pioneered the mechanical analysis of mouse preimplantation development together with Dr Takashi Hiiragi at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg. Since then, the lab of Jean-Léon Maître uses microscopy, genetics and biophysics tools to understand the forces controlling the early development of mammals, including humans.