Born in 1966 in Lannilis, Brittany, the celtic northwestern part of France. After completing his undergraduate studies at the University of Nantes in 1989, he moved to the USA and obtained his PhD at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in summer 1994 under the supervision of Prof. John Ralph. Trained both in organic synthesis and NMR spectroscopy in relation with phenolic lignin chemistry, he then joined the laboratory of Prof. Ken S. Feldman at The Pennsylvania State University in State College, USA, as a post-doctoral fellow to work on phenolic natural products bioorganic chemistry and glucopyranosic ellagitannin synthesis …