Skip to main content
Vilcek Foundation

Join our Mailing List

Close
Vilcek Foundation
  • About
    • About

      The Vilcek Foundation raises awareness of immigrant contributions in the United States and fosters appreciation of the arts and sciences.

    • Our Mission
    • Board & Staff
    • Press Center
    • Contact
  • Prizes
    • Prizes

      The Vilcek Foundation Prizes are awarded to foreign-born individuals for extraordinary achievement in the arts and sciences.

    • About the Prizes

      Learn more about the Vilcek Foundation Prizes and the prizewinners.

    • Vilcek Prizes

      Awarded to immigrants with a legacy of major accomplishments.

    • Vilcek Prizes for Creative Promise

      Awarded to young immigrant professionals who have demonstrated outstanding achievement early in their careers.

    • Vilcek Prize for Excellence

      Awarded to immigrants who have had a significant impact on American society, or to individuals who are dedicated champions of immigrant causes.

    • Prize Recipients
    • Grants for Organizations
  • Art
  • Events
  • News
Search
Home > News > Ibrahim Cissé: The power of visibility

Ibrahim Cissé: The power of visibility

News | March 29, 2021
Share this page
Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Ibrahim Cissé with a big smile, wearing a red jacket, standing in front of the steps of an MIT building.

Growing up in Niamey, Niger, Ibrahim Cissé loved science. The youngest of five children, he was thrilled by the potential that experimentation provided for learning about and understanding the natural and physical world. With his family’s encouragement, he labeled a storage room in his family’s home the “Laboratoire Cissé.” It became the site of Ibrahim’s first experiments: deconstructing, learning about, and reconstructing his family’s appliances and devices.

One of the thrilling parts of working in a laboratory is waking up every day and not knowing what may be discovered by the day’s end, says Ibrahim. “Science is all about that,” he says. “If you limit your imagination, you are limiting questions you may ask that can lead you to incredible discoveries.”

Ibrahim now directs his own laboratory—the Cissé Lab—currently in the Department of Physics and the Department of Biology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The Cissé lab is also in the process of moving to the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where Ibrahim is a professor of physics. “I feel like it’s still playtime. It’s still fun, and it’s still curiosity-driven,” he says. Ibrahim receives a Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science for using super-resolution biological imaging to directly visualize the dynamic nature of gene expression in living cells.

Ibrahim writes in a notebook at a table on a rooftop deck.

The Cissé Lab focuses on the use of microscopic techniques and technologies that enable scientists to observe the behavior of individual biomolecules in living cells. Using single-molecule based, live cell super-resolution microscopy (so-called PALM and STORM microscopy), Ibrahim has been able to observe the physical properties and behaviors of RNA polymerase enzymes as they decode DNA into RNA. These observations allow researchers to better understand how concepts from physics—including condensed matter physics, fluid dynamics, and mechanics—can be applied to understand biological processes. The techniques that Ibrahim’s work has pioneered also have the potential to help scientists to better understand the way protein aggregates form in neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s, ALS, and Alzheimer’s.

Ibrahim Cissé wearing a red jacket sits smiling on the steps of an MIT building.

“Physics is a really solid framework on which to understand nature from a very fundamental and mathematical standpoint,” says Ibrahim. “[It enables us] to take this complex problem, and break it down and frame it in a constructive manner.”

The importance of open-mindedness and flexibility in problem solving is of particular importance to Ibrahim. While participating in a summer internship at Princeton, Ibrahim was presented with a question of how the geometry of an object could be used to understand relative packing density and points of contact when packed at random in a container. Using M&M’s candies and paint, Ibrahim designed a creative experiment that helped him and his team make a discovery. They published their findings in Science magazine while Ibrahim was still an undergraduate at North Carolina Central University.

A researcher works with green and blue lasers in the Cissé Lab at MIT.

Ibrahim’s experiences at North Carolina Central University have profoundly shaped his approach to science and mentorship. “Having trained at a historically Black college was just an incredible way of learning to see and think about race, and not just in America but also in Africa,” he says. “It gave me the knowledge and that empowerment that, no matter what adversity I was going to face, it is important to move forward in a way that will empower others and create opportunity for others.”

“It’s important for students—especially those who come from underprivileged backgrounds—to realize that the best thing they have, beside talent and hard work, is the creativity and the level of enthusiasm they can bring to the table,” says Ibrahim. “Everything else can be learned.”

Related News

February 22, 2021

Ruth Lehmann: “There’s always another question… there’s always more to find out”

Molecular and cellular biologist Ruth Lehmann receives the Vilcek Prize in Biomedical Science for her research and leadership in the field.
A portrait of Ruth Lehmann in a black blazer as she stands on a bridge over the Charles River.
February 10, 2020

Xiaowei Zhuang: Making the Unseen Seen

Xiaowei Zhuang has pioneered imaging techniques that enable scientists to see the innermost workings of human cells. “The fundamental drive,” she says, “is to figure out how things work.”
Xiaowei Zhuang in a STORM microscopy lab at Harvard University.
February 8, 2021

Silvi Rouskin: “The pandemic has been an extreme cause for speed and urgency”

Molecular biologist Silvi Rouskin studies the structure of RNA viruses like HIV-1 and SARS-CoV-2, seeking weaknesses that could lead to treatments and interventions.
Silvi Rouskin standing on a Boston city street.

You may also be interested in

2021 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science

Ibrahim Cissé

Born in Niger
Ibrahim Cissé receives the Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science for using super-resolution biological imaging to directly visualize the dynamic nature of gene expression in living cells.
Portrait of Ibrahim Cissé
2013 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science

Hashim Al-Hashimi

Born in Lebanon
Hashim Al-Hashimi receives the Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science for using biophysical and computational methods to probe the dynamic properties of life-sustaining biomolecules such as DNA, RNA, and the proteins that interact with them, paving the way toward targeted drug discovery.
Hashim Al-Hashimi
2021 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science

Silvi Rouskin

Born in Bulgaria
Silvi Rouskin receives the Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science for developing methods to unravel the shapes of RNA molecules inside cells and aiding the potential development of RNA-based therapeutics.
Portrait of Silvi Rouskin

Join our Mailing List

Vilcek Foundation
21 East 70th Street
New York, New York 10021

Phone: 212.472.2500

Email: info@vilcek.org

  • About
    • Our Mission
    • Board and Staff
    • Press Center
    • Contact
  • Prizes
    • Vilcek Prizes
    • Vilcek Prizes for Creative Promise
    • Vilcek Prize for Excellence
    • Prize Recipients
    • Grants for Organizations
  • Art
  • Events
  • News
Connect with us
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • Privacy Policy
  • Accessibility Statement
© 2021   Vilcek Foundation