The Cotrel Foundation was created by a former orthopedic surgeon who had dedicated his life to improving surgical treatments for scoliotic patients. After the implementation of the Cotrel-Dubousset instrumentation (1983) which positively changed the lives of over 4 million patients in the world; Dr Cotrel aimed to understand the mechanisms of idiopathic scoliosis. The purpose of the Foundation was to select and financially support the most deserving and promising research teams from all over the world, enabling them to investigate the causes of idiopathic scoliosis. The Board’s mission is to identify and accompany the teams for the whole duration of their research. Scientific symposiums are organized once a year to stimulate the exchanges between the teams. This has led to unexpected collaboration breaking both geographical and disciplinaries boundaries : A multidisciplinary France-Canada research team, through their wide-open research in genetics, biology and physiology, have discovered defects in centrosomes and cilia that may underlie scoliosis pathogenesis. Their major and lasting contribution was the identification of the first gene causing familial scoliosis.
