Eric Maréchal is Director of Research at CNRS and is currently Director of the Cell and Plant Physiology Laboratory, a joint unit of CNRS, CEA, INRA and University Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble, France. He completed his PhD at University of Grenoble Alpes, France, in 1994. From 1994 to 1997 he joined the Nam-Hai Chua Laboratory at the Rockefeller University, New York, USA. After a short period in the Biocatalysis division at Rhône-Poulenc, Lyon, he joined the CNRS in 1998. He is an expert in lipid metabolism and physiology of algae and plants, in relation to their evolution and their environment.