François-Olivier Hébert

François-Olivier Hébert

The world we live in is vast, mysterious, fascinating and scary. Understanding why natural systems came into existence and deciphering their intricate and fundamental mechanisms have always been a passion of mine, almost like an obsession that constantly grows and thrives as layers of knowledge accumulate. It was thus natural for me to complete a bachelor’s degree in biology at Université Laval. During my undergraduate studies, my broad and complementary interests in different fields of study in biology allowed me to work in marine ecology with invertebrate communities in the Canadian maritimes, in applied genetics with the honey bee in an agricultural context in the province of Québec, in behavioral ecology with seal populations in the St-Lawerence river, in eco-toxicology with the endangered beluga population of the St-Lawerence estuary, and in fundamental research focused on the mechanisms of genome evolution (speciation). I then specifically trained in evolutionary genomics (population genomics, genome evolution) at Université Laval (Msc, 2010-2012) and I recently obtained my Phd in ecological genomics of host-parasite interactions at Université Laval (2013-2017). I joined the Levesque lab in April 2017 and I now work as a post-doctoral researcher on various projects in the lab. My main focus is functional genomics and bioinformatics, so whenever there is some code to script somewhere, I’ll be there like a happy camper helping out and spreading the Python love! But beware the simple unidimensional souls, because science is not the only way to understand the world surrounding us. When I am not coding, I try to observe and feel our societies through other perception tools, such as visual arts, music, and intensive gardening.

 

“The whole world is wild at heart and weird on top” – David Lynch