[1] Born in Meaux, Courtier-Orgogozo took preparatory classes in Life and Earth Sciences so she could pursue a career in biology, and she graduated from Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS).

She earned her Ph.D. at Pierre and Marie Curie University with the thesis titled, Formation of sensory organs in D. Melanogaster: cell lineages, apoptosis and evolution supervised by François Schweisguth.

[3][4] Her interests have centered on the molecular and cellular mechanisms that lead to the formation of a complex multicellular being from a single egg.

[5][6] In April 2010, Courtier-Orgogozo began supervising an ATIP-AVENIR four-person team at the Institut Jacques Monod in Paris.

[5] The Irène Joliot-Curie Prize that she received in 2014 cited her research on mutations responsible for changes that occurred during the evolution of several species of Drosophila flies, to trace their evolutionary history and to better understand the fundamental mechanisms and the general understanding of their evolution, past and future.