David Hicks
David Hicks is an INSERM full professor at the Institute for Cellular and Integrative Neurosciences (INCI) in Strasbourg. He is trained in Zoology from the University of Bristol, UK, and a PhD in Neurobiology from the University of London obtained in 1981. He started his research carrier in North America, first in the Dept. Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, University of B.C., Vancouver Canada, then in the Laboratory of Neurobiology headed by Prof. Torsten Wiesel, Nobel Prize in Physiology & Medicine 1981, at the Rockefeller University, New York USA. Since his postdoctoral studies David has always been interested in cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying differentiation, function and survival of the retina. His early work identified a novel protein involved in hereditary blindness, before focusing on the role of a family of neuroactive proteins, the “fibroblast growth factors (FGFs)”, in retinal pathophysiology. Recruited by INSERM in 1988, he subsequently moved to Strasbourg to help build up a new laboratory mixing basic and clinical research on vision. He is currently co-director of the group “Rhythms, Life and Death in the Retina” at INCI, working on the role of the circadian clock in retinal pathophysiology, and the central role of cones in vision.
As part of his fellowship, David Hicks is working on Human blinding diseases: breaking new ground using a novel small mammal model to analyze cone function and survival, with her collaborators Franck Baas and Maarten Kamermans.