Nicole Le Douarin is an experimental embryologist whose research has focussed on both the development of the immune system and the importance of the neural crest in the formation of the head and brain within vertebrate embryos.
Having discovered that cells from quails can be uniquely marked, Nicole’s studies have stemmed from following the movement and fates of embryonic cells within quail–chick chimeras — single organisms containing cells of genetically distinct origins. This approach led to the first identification of stem cells within the neural crest.