meet the montreal microbiologist with a million instagram followers
5 minute read
what began as a pandemic hobby has become a full-fledged career for microbiologist chloé savard, who spends hours a day in the "microverse" poring over her samples, such as the pear pictured above, in a tiny lab in her plateau apartment.
allen mcinnis and chloÉ savard
/
montreal gazette
what do tears, semen, menstrual blood, breast milk and animal feces have in common? they’ve all been under montreal microbiologist chloé savard’s microscope at some point, the kaleidoscopic images shared on instagram for her one million followers to marvel at.
in a tiny lab in her plateau apartment, savard can spend hours a day in the “microverse” poring over her samples. what began as a pandemic hobby has become a full-fledged career thanks to videos fit for an episode of the magic school bus, drawing the attention of pharmaceutical companies, science museums and even the entertainment industry, among others. if savard’s instagram followers are the passengers, she is ms. frizzle, the eccentric bus driver finding unique ways to generate excitement about science.
“i try to give people hope to find beauty in the smallest things,” said savard, 32, also known as @tardibabe—an homage to her favourite microscopic animal, the tardigrade or “water bear.”
chloé savard in her lab in montreal on friday, jan. 9, 2026. photo by allen mcinnis /montreal gazette
the images are shot on an iphone through an olympus microscope that creates a 3d effect, further accentuated by colourful filters on the microscope itself. viewers are welcome to meditate while watching the whimsical videos or read the caption to know exactly what they’re seeing, savard said.
advertisement
a creature that looks like a pinball machine and a creepy-crawly had a baby? that would be a rotifer, one of the smallest animals on earth.
“it looks like a monster,” savard said, noting it’s one of the weirdest things she has ever discovered. it came from a pond in granby.
a screenshot from chloé savard’s microscopic video of a rotifer. photo by chloé savard
savard’s first viral video was of a pear, complete with a caption about why they’re so much grittier than other fruit (they have “stone cells,” shiny structures that look like small rocks or the centre of a flower, she explains).
her content started gaining traction online when she began filming everyday subjects, like fruit.
“people love to see what they can’t see,” savard said. “and i think i can also create art from something we never thought could be art.”
a microscopic image of a pear. photo by chloé savard
her most viewed video is one of her own tears. it got 77 million views and 4.4 million likes.
“it was kind of a hard pass in my life, and i decided to film my tears drying,” she said, explaining that the video shows salts forming. “and then you can see some lipids, so i was able, afterwards, to identify the lipids.”
a screenshot from chloé savard’s microscopic video of her tears drying. photo by chloé savard
sometimes savard can tell what she’s looking at right away, other times she does research. it can also take time to find anything in a sample if she’s analyzing something like pond water. it once took her a whopping eight hours to find a face mite, which came from her left eyebrow. her determination was propelled by a series with savoir media called créatures microscopiques.
advertisement
“i didn’t want to look at someone else’s face, i wanted to find one on my own,” savard said.
the series has two seasons, with a third possibly to come. other projects include an upcoming book of images, conferences and workshops, and a columnist gig at l’université de montréal’s research magazine dire. savard also collaborates with apple and olympus, which provided the equipment she uses to work.
she also regularly has contracts with companies that can either lease the non-exclusive rights to her existing videos or request new images of something specific. the phrase “just another day at the office” takes on a new meaning in savard’s lab, where earlier this month she was examining period blood for a contract. she combined the blood, which is packed with white blood cells, with algae, yeast and bacteria.
“the white blood cells are going to go and eat (the pathogens),” savard explained. “it’s to show the immune system in action.”
white blood cells are shown on an iphone mounted on a microscope in chloé savard’s lab. photo by allen mcinnis /montreal gazette
the final product was later posted online in collaboration with science up first, a national initiative that aims to “fight misinformation and promote scientific understanding.”
the goal was to illustrate the importance of vaccines.
“the role of your immune system is to protect you against a wide variety of pathogens such as viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites,” the caption reads. “when you get vaccinated, you train your system to recognize and destroy a potential threat.”
advertisement
savard’s work is a reminder that there’s much more to the world than meets the eye. she once found microplastics in her nasal mucus.
“you can see pollution in the micro-scale,” she said. “you can see how delicate and fragile the micro-organisms are and how important they are for the rest of the animals, or to produce oxygen in the ocean, depending on which microbes we’re talking about. they all have different roles and everything is interconnected. … we just cannot see the result from the naked eye.”
her favourite tiny creature to observe, the tardigrade, measures a maximum of 0.7 millimetres but is one of the most resilient animals in the world, so much so that they’ve appeared in pop culture for their superhero-like qualities.
“they have been into space and they survived the vacuum of space, x-rays, uv,” savard said. “they’ve been shot from guns at different speeds to see what is the fastest speed they would survive.”
a microscopic photo of a tardigrade, also known as a water bear. photo by chloé savard
their resilience is something savard can relate to, hence the homage in her username. before pursuing a bachelor’s degree in microbiology at l’université de montréal, savard studied music — specifically, the drums — but a chronic illness forced her to pivot. at first, to combine her passions, she composed and recorded all the music for her videos, but it became too time-consuming.
advertisement
still, she’s methodical about how she pairs image and sound.
“everything flows,” she said. “it’s like a second nature for me.”
nowadays, it can take anywhere from 12 to 24 hours for savard to turn a concept into a video.
the ideas are all her own.
“i have to write them down and see what’s the best idea and sometimes i just have flashes in my head like, ‘oh, maybe that would look good,’” she said.
that was the case when she decided to examine bird poop, which ended up being one of her favourite videos because she discovered their urine looks like glitter.
“i was just outside in my backyard looking up at the birds, and i was like, ‘hmm, let’s try this,’” she said. “i was kind of mind-blown.”
a screenshot from chloé savard’s microscopic video of bird poop. photo by chloé savard
though creating content of the microverse has become savard’s full-time job, “it’s still a hobby because it still brings me joy and i still have the passion and i get excited,” she said.
“i want to make it significant. … i try to make something that will change people’s lives.”
this article was originally published in the montreal gazette on january 20, 2026.
share story
