Stéphanie Lacour

Nationality: French

EPFL VPS
CE 3 315 (Centre Est)
Station 1
1015 Lausanne

EPFL STI INX-STI LSBI
B3 2 225.134 (Campus Biotech bâtiment B3)
Ch. des Mines 9
CH-1202 Genève

Expertise

Bioelectronics; implantable electrodes; thin-film devices; soft (bio)materials; neuroprosthetics; clinical translation

Mission

Bioelectronics integrates principles of electrical engineering to biology, medicine and ultimately health. My lab challenges and seeks to advance our fundamental concepts in man-made electronic systems applied to biology. Specifically, the focus is on designing and manufacturing electronic devices with mechanical properties close to those of the host biological tissue so that long-term reliability and minimal perturbation are induced in vivo and/or truly wearable systems become possible.
We use fabrication methods borrowed from the MEMS and microelectronics industries and adapt them to soft substrates like elastomers. We develop novel characterization tools adapted to mechanically compliant bioelectronic circuits. We evaluate in vitro, in animal models and ultimately on humans our soft bioelectronic interfaces
Stéphanie P. Lacour is full professor at the School of Engineering at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
She received her PhD in Electrical Engineering from INSA de Lyon, France, and completed postdoctoral research at Princeton University (USA) and the University of Cambridge (UK).
She joined EPFL in 2011.
She was the founding director of EPFL Neuro X institute & a new interschool department focused on interdisciplinary and translational neuro-research located at EPFL-associated campus & Campus Biotech in Geneva. Since 2025, she is EPFL Vice-President for support to Strategic Initiatives.

Education

Ph.D.

|

1998 – 2001 INSA, Lyon, France

M.Sc.

| Integrated Electronic Devices

1998 – 1998 INSA, Lyon France

Awards

ERC Starting Grant

European Research Council

2010

2022 Best Brain Paper (IEEE and SSCS) award

IEEE

2023

Shortlisted for the A F Harvey Prize

2020

Selected publications

Silicone substrate with in situ relief for stretchable thin-film transistors

I.M. Graz, D.P.J. Cotton, A. Robinson, S.P. Lacour
Published in Applied Physics Letters, 2011, vol. 98, 124101. in

Flexible and stretchable micro-electrodes for in vitro and in vivo neural interfaces, Special Issue � Review

S.P. Lacour, S. Benmerah, E. Tarte, J. FitzGerald, J. Serra, S. McMahon, J. Fawcett, O. Graudejus, Z. Yu, B. Morrison III
Published in Medical & Biological Engineering & Computing, June 2010, vol. 48, p. 945-954. in

Micro-channel electrode arrays: a novel type of regenerative peripheral nerve interface (Journal Cover)

S.P. Lacour, J.J. FitzGerald, N. Lago, E. Tarte, S. McMahon, J.W. Fawcett
Published in EEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering, special issue on Neural interfaces to the Peripheral Nervous System, 2009, vol. 17, no. 5, p. 454-460. in

A Multifunctional Capacitive Sensor for Stretchable Electronic Skins

D.P. Cotton, I. Graz, S.P. Lacour
Published in EEE Sensors Journal, 2009, vol. 9, no. 12, p. 2008-2009 in

Stretchable interconnects for elastic electronic surfaces

S.P. Lacour, J. Jones, S. Wagner, T. Li, Z. Suo
Published in Proceedings of the IEEE on Flexible Electronics Technology, 2005, vol. 93, no. 8, p. 1459-1467. in

Stretchable gold conductors on elastomeric substrates

S. P�richon Lacour, S. Wagner, Z. Huang, Z. Suo
Published in Applied Physics Letters, 2003, vol. 82, no.15, p. 2404-2406. in

Measurement of porous silicon thermal conductivity by micro-Raman scattering

S. P�richon, V. Lysenko, B. Remaki, B. Champagnon, D. Barbier
Published in Journal of Applied Physics, 1999, vol. 86, no.8, p. 4700-4702. in

LSBI

Teaching & PhD

PhD Students

Laurine Kolly, Desirée Maulà, Luca Robert Liebi, Angela Braccia, Scott Andrew Erickson, Seyed Sajjad Mirbakht, Pietro Palopoli, Emilio Fernández Lavado

Past EPFL PhD Students

Cédric Xavier Paulou, Alessia Romeo, Amélie Guex, Hadrien Olivier Michaud, Arthur Edouard Hirsch, Frédéric Michoud, Sandra Gribi, Nicolas Vachicouras, Laurent Mirko Dejace, Florian Fallegger, Michael Shur, Florent-Valéry Coen, Noaf Salah Ali Alwahab, Valentina Marie Paggi, Emilie Revol, Yashwanth Vyza, Danashi Imani Medagoda, Kangling Wu, Eleonora Martinelli

Past EPFL PhD Students as codirector

Outman Akouissi

Courses

Neural interfaces

NX-422

Neural interfaces (NI) are bioelectronic systems that interface the nervous system to digital technologies. This course presents their main building blocks (transducers, instrumentation & communication), reviews current and upcoming materials and technological solutions for implantable & wearable NI