Félix A. Rey is a distinguished scientist with an impressive academic background and an international scientific career. He holds a physics degree from Instituto Balseiro in Argentina and a PhD in structural biology from Université Paris-Saclay in France. He further specialized in viral structural studies at Harvard University.

Returning to France, he initiated his career as a junior principal investigator under the CNRS ATIPE program in Gif-sur-Yvette, becoming then director of the Laboratory of Structural Molecular Virology. Since 2005, he has headed the Structural Virology Unit at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, within the Department of Virology.

His research investigates the mechanism of membrane fusion used by enveloped viruses to enter cells. This work led first to the identification of a separate structural class of viral membrane fusion proteins, to then show that they are related to eukaryotic proteins involved in cell-cell fusion. A key example is the HAP2 protein, which drives gamete fusion in organism belonging to all main branches of the eukaryotic tree and implying that the last eukaryotic common ancestor already underwent sexual reproduction via HAP2-mediated gamete fusion.

Félix Rey also made important contributions to understand the interactions of viral proteins with their cell receptors and the identification of epitopes targeted by neutralizing antibodies against pathogenic viruses, providing important insight for the development of novel immunogens in an epitope-focused reverse vaccinology approach.

Prof. Dr. Felix Rey