Professor Marc Fontecave is a Professor at Collège de France. He is a distinguished member of the French Academy of Sciences, Academia Europaea, and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. His research focuses on the study of catalysts (homogeneous, heterogeneous, bioinspired) and biocatalysts (metalloenzymes and artificial enzymes) as well as electrochemical devices for water splitting and the valorization of carbon dioxide as strategies for chemical storage of renewable energies (artificial photosynthesis).

Professor Fontecave is a graduate of the École normale supérieure Paris-Saclay in Paris, and holds a doctorate in Science.

Professor Fontecave received numerous awards and honours, such as CNRS Silver medal (2004), Achille-Le-Bel Grand Prize of the Société Chimique de France (2011) and Chevalier of the Légion d'Honneur (2015), Officier of the Ordre National du Mérite (2021) etc.

Education

1. Ecole Normale Supérieure de l'enseignement Technique, Cachan (1975-1980)
2. Agrégation de Sciences Physiques-option Chimie (1978)
3. Thèse de 3ème Cycle-Université Paris VI (1981)
4. Thèse d'Etat- Université Paris VI (1984)

Experience

1. Professor, Collège de France, Paris 
2. Director of the Laboratory of Chemistry of Biological Processes, Collège de France, Paris
3. Director of the Institute of Chemistry, Collège de France, Paris 
4. Member of the French Academy of Sciences 
5. Foreign Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences 
6. President of the Foundation of the Collège de France (2013 – 2023)
7. Professor, Université Joseph Fourier, Grenoble (1988-2009)
8. Chargé de recherches CNRS-Université René Descartes (Paris V) (1985-1988)
9. Post-doctoral fellow, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden (1985-1986)
10. Attaché de recherches CNRS- ENS, Paris (1981-1985)
11. Assistant Professor, Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS), Paris (1980-1981)

Awards

1. Officier de l'Ordre national du Mérite (2021)
2. Election at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (2019)
3. Chevalier de l'Ordre national de la Légion d'Honneur (2015)
4. Prix Achille Le Bel, French Chemical Society (2012)
5. Election at Academia Europea (2010)
6. Sir Raman Chair of the Academy of Sciences of Bangalore, India (2009-2010)
7. Senior Member of the Institut Universitaire de France (IUF) (2005-2009)
8. Election at the French Academy of Sciences (2005)
9. Médaille d'argent (Silver medal), CNRS (2004)

Five Significant Scholarly Outputs

1. From Hydrogenase Mimics to Noble-Metal Free Hydrogen-Evolving Electrocatalytic Nanomaterials A Le Goff, V. Artero, B. Jousselme, N. Guillet, R. Metaye, A. Fihri, S. Palacin, M. Fontecave Science 2009, 326, 1384-1387 
2. Pyranopterin Related Dithiolene Molybdenum Complexes as Homogeneous Catalysts for CO2 Photoreduction T. Fogeron, P. Retailleau, L.-M. Chamoreau, Y. Li, M. Fontecave Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. Engl. 2018, .51, 17033-17037
3. Low-cost high efficiency system for solar-driven conversion of CO2 to hydrocarbonsHuan Ngoc Tran, D. Alves Dalla Corte, S. Lamaison, L. Lutz, N. Menguy, M. Foldyna, S.-H. Turren-Cruz, A Hagfeldt, F. Bella, M. Fontecave, V. Mougel. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 2019, 116, 9735-9740 
4. Bio-inspired hydrophobicity promotes CO2 reduction on a Cu surface D. Wakerley, S. Lamaison, F. Ozanam, N. Menguy, D. Mercier, P. Marcus, M. Fontecave, V. Mougel Nature Materials 2019, 18., 1222-1227
5. Benchmarking of Oxygen Evolution Catalysts on Porous Nickel Supports: Towards Optimised Anode Materials. A. Peugeot, C. E. Creissen, D. Karapinar, H. Ngoc Tran, M. Schreiber, M. Fontecave Joule 2021, .5., 1281-1300