To achieve this goal, it will address:

Modeling brain development using neuronal cells derived from induced pluripotent stem cells, organoids and animal models.

The development of a new generation of genetic and epigenetic tests for individuals with neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities, using a combination of genomic, epigenetic and phenotypic data.

Identifying risk and resilience factors for neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities.

The hallmark of childhood is its fantastic capacity for learning. It is the period of life when learning is most rapid and complex.

Whether you're learning a language, a musical instrument, a sport or a new concept, it's best to start early. Why? Because the brain, that remarkable learning machine, develops intensely at this time of life, and is highly plastic!

During the first year, when a young child is learning to walk, talk, recognize family members, etc., all parents notice the changes from week to week, but they are less aware of their baby's intense thinking activity: he or she looks, listens, pays attention, remembers, guesses, plans, chooses and hopes from the very first weeks of life. This early learning within the family is crucial for the future, as it forms the basis for later learning at school.

This is why the Institut Robert-Debré du Cerveau de l’Enfant focuses on early childhood, on those first years that are so important for understanding the mechanisms of human cerebral and cognitive development, its similarities and particularities compared to other animals, but also on the diversity of developmental trajectories. Why this or that difficulty? How to explain it, and above all how to help the child, especially at school.

The great advance of recent years has been the arrival of brain imaging, which enables us to see the anatomical organization of the brain and observe how it reacts to an image or sound, as well as how it is activated when the person is thinking, imagining or learning.

Although much remains to be discovered, brain imaging and the numerous results obtained in experimental psychology have considerably modified models of learning and development.

The Robert-Debré du Cerveau de l’Enfant Institute will draw on the complementarity between teams at Robert-Debré Hospital, the Laboratoire de Psychologie du Développement et de l'Éducation de l'Enfant (LaPsyDÉ) and NeuroSpin's research laboratories, renowned for their methodological expertise in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data acquisition and processing, and their imaging studies providing models of cognition and brain development in infants and children. The aim of WP2 is to improve the description of cerebral and cognitive phenotypes. Several axes are therefore planned:

The development of the next generation of anatomical and functional brain imaging techniques for use in young children and school-age children.

Modeling cognition and learning, particularly in the areas of sensorimotricity, social cognition, executive functions, oral and written language, and mathematics.

Characterization of inter-individual variability in brain development (structural and functional), cognitive and behavioral trajectories, the role of the socio-economic environment and points of divergence in neurodevelopmental disorders.

This WP will draw on Neurospin's MRI expertise, particularly in very high magnetic fields (MRI at 7T is starting to be used in children, and NeuroSpin and CEA teams have created a unique MRI for humans, at 11.7T), but also on advances in electrophysiology (EEG, MEG) to obtain portable devices.

Through integration with clinicians and families at the Institut Robert-Debré du Cerveau de l’Enfant, WP2 will provide new tools for early detection, detailed characterization of cognitive difficulties and their impact on schooling, and guidance on remediation and compensation.

The Institut Robert-Debré du Cerveau de l’Enfant aims to support the development and well-being of every child at every moment of his or her life, taking into account the diversity of individual trajectories in the wider context of society, and of their daily lives, at home, at nursery, at school and in hospital.

Our aim is to provide better support for children's learning and care, by integrating what we know about how the brain works, its cognitive resources and how to overcome its weaknesses.

Ultimately, we want to give every child the opportunity to make the most of his or her individual potential in learning and development, and limit the deleterious impact of any disorders or difficulties the child may have. Our ultimate aim is to improve the quality of learning and the effectiveness of interventions where necessary.

We focus primarily on the early years of life, from birth to the first years of elementary school: a relatively unexplored period when a deeper understanding of neurodevelopment, learning modalities and better care management can bring significant benefits to children's long-term trajectories.

Pragmatically, we want to :

Create a Living Lab to foster innovation and reinforce proof of real effectiveness

Create a digital portal that promotes screening, information and support for children at nursery, home or school.

Transforming children's healthcare pathways within a better, less unequal and more open hospital organization

Enable the creation of a clinical trials platform for children, and thus support the emergence of new evidence-based therapeutic practices and innovations.

The strength of the Robert-Debré du Cerveau de l’Enfant Institute will lie in the data collected in an organized structure enabling researchers and clinicians to interrogate data at different scales.

In addition, we will develop predictive models of children's developmental trajectories. Such models are needed to focus remediation efforts on key skills at a given point in their critical plasticity period. Such predictive models require broad-spectrum, high-quality, longitudinal and multi-scale data.

The profound change in the care and education pathway for children with neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities means that existing structures need to be strengthened to create a health data warehouse (bio-bank) that supports the Institute's MindLogger and Care hub's data collection, storage and security efforts to support in-depth research and innovation.

The specific objectives of this axis are as follows:

The creation of an analytical and computational research support team

The creation of a healthcare data warehouse IHU-Hub bringing together massive imaging, omics and clinical data

Integration of longitudinal data from publicly available datasets

The development of statistical and artificial intelligence models to predict children's trajectories at an early age