In 1990, I began my career at CEA DAM in plasma physics. Several facets presented themselves to me: the equation of state, the opacity and the transport coefficients. We formed a working group on the equation of state of hydrogen between 1998 and 2001. Then, I led a working group on opacities until 2009. In 2010, I returned to the study of transport coefficients (viscosity and diffusion), relaxation between ion and electron temperatures and the effect that plasma has in increasing fusion reaction rates. Since 2022, the theme of my activities has gradually shifted towards the study of the equation of state of condensed matter. With William Weens, we are currently developing an orbital-free molecular dynamics code (Archè) with the goal of achieving sufficient precision in the domain of dense, warm matter to feed equation of state models.

In summary, my career has led me to develop “atomes crochus” that connect with disordered systems, atomic physics, and relaxation phenomena. I hope to bring younger generations of researchers along these paths.