They arrive together, shoulder to shoulder, absorbed in their exchanges. As if there were only them in this room at the Vaud university hospital in Lausanne, where physiotherapists, research engineers and one of their patients are busy. Grégoire Courtine and Jocelyne Bloch have been collaborating for twelve years. From the intensity of the look they have at each other, it seems as if love at first sight has just happened.
From the union – professional only – between this French neuroscientist, team leader at the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne, and this Vaud neurosurgeon was born one of the most impressive medical advances of the century. Thanks to their care, people with paraplegia get up and walk again. A feat, the result of twenty years of relentless research, carried out in partnership with the Clinatec research center in Grenoble.
Through the window, the gloomy weather contrasts with the warm reunions. The duo comes to make sure that Michel, one of their miracle workers, is doing well. In 2017, an animal threw itself under the wheels of the motorcycle driven by this 32-year-old Italian with long hair. His spinal cord exploded. “I had to drag myself through the debris to find my phone and call for help, before passing out,” he says, as if he were talking about a bruise. When he wakes up, he no longer feels his legs. The doctors tell him that he will never be able to stand up again.
At the time, Grégoire Courtine was already making monkeys walk again. The second feat in his collection, after that of laboratory mice, in 2012. His method is based on a chip implanted in the spinal cord. With each electrical signal, the muscles contract. Depending on the area, intensity, frequency, the movement varies. By scouring the Web in search of remedies, Michel comes across Dr. Courtine’s primates and rodents, and, despite the prophetic side of these feats, decides to believe in them.
Many thought he was crazy.
A first refusal follows: Michel is too damaged to be accepted into the neuroscientist’s trials. No matter, the young man continues to train. He prepares his thighs, his calves and his brain as best he can: “I imagined myself walking, again and again, so as not to lose this function, in case I could one day be reconnected to my body.” His shoulders become as broad as the seat he uses to move around. Grégoire Courtine ends up saying yes. Jocelyne Bloch operates it.
In the operating room, the specialist has gotten into the habit of testing her electrodes directly to find out if they are correctly placed. Few female surgeons get involved in such experimental projects. There are very few female surgeons at all: the profession still tolerates few women today. Those close to him had recommended that he study literature. She finally changed to medicine, became passionate about the brain, and became one of the best neurosurgeons of her generation.
When she meets Grégoire Courtine, many people think he is crazy. Other scientists are so careful. He is free, tempestuous, sometimes insolent. After his thesis, the hyperactive went to the United States, to the University of California (UCLA). “There, you know how to think for yourself,” repeats this former climbing champion. He learns to break down barriers, works in contact with patients, with multidisciplinary teams, from physiotherapists to biologists. During these years of study, of Staps then of neurology, a crazy idea came to him: what if it was possible to “wake up” what nerves remained in the least affected paraplegics?
What should have been a simple lead turned into a huge hope. By stimulating their mice, Grégoire Courtine and Jocelyne Bloch realized that they were regaining some sensations. When the injury is partial, the nerves grow back. New connections are created, aroundold primary circuits. The same goes for humans. Not enough to overcome the handicap, but enough to believe in it. For this to work, you don’t just have to move the limbs. Patients also have to control the movement in their head. Grégoire Courtine understood this before the others.
Now equipped, Michel only has to grab his tablet so that, suddenly, his legs become untangled. The team of two scientists – which now numbers around sixty people – loaded a series of programs there. Simply press a button on the walker to activate one of them. The Italian, an N and an R printed on his t-shirt in reference to the center of Grégoire Courtine and Jocelyne Bloch, NeuroRestore, stands up. His legs rise, then bend. Without his tablet, the athlete falls. Once, a journalist messed with it, playing with it.
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Spectacular results
Perhaps the duo will one day succeed in “curing” the paralyzed, making them regain enough mobility so that they can lead a normal life. In November 2023, he succeeded in adapting his work to a patient with Parkinson’s disease, who regained smooth walking. And, since last May, they have also coupled some of their devices with a chip that they insert into the cranium of their patients. Michel doesn’t want it. The operation scares him. The results, however, are spectacular: with training and a little artificial intelligence, the sensor deciphers brain intention. Action is guided by thought. Almost as if nothing had happened.
There are always a few unforeseen events. Because of their injuries, patients can no longer contract the muscles that control the tension in the arteries and adjust the flow of blood. They get up, yes, but often almost faint. Their bodies require a long time to warm up, like diesels that are revved up too quickly. “We have developed a device to provide electrical stimulation requiredwhich represents a new significant gain for patients”, specifies Grégoire Courtine.
The Pierre and Marie Curie of surgery
They are said to be the Pierre and Marie Curie of surgery. The new Elon Musk itself, according to many media. The comparison is false, it offends them. The billionaire became interested in the subject after them, and is not a scientist at all. Its implants currently only allow it to control a computer, a simpler task. And they are more invasive, because they are positioned in the soft part of the brain, between the neurons. More precise on paper, the method is also more risky and unstable.
With each new meeting, the duo strives to make people forget the American, who is much better listed on the stock market. Even if it means talking about it even when it is not mentioned. There are still some similarities. To succeed in new technologies and raise enough funds, you have to know how to sell your dreams before they become reality. “I met Elon Musk at a conference. He said he was going to compete with NASA with private shuttles. It seemed impossible, but he did it,” confides Grégoire Courtine. Hadn’t the Frenchman also promised, in 2013, that he would make paraplegics walk again?