Following a lengthy nomination process, Thierry Dauxois’s appointment as president of the CNRS was approved on Wednesday, June 10, 2026, by the Council of Ministers. The relevant committees of the Senate and the National Assembly had previously issued a favorable opinion on the proposal made by the President of the Republic on May 21, 2026.

During his hearing before the National Assembly, Thierry Dauxois vigorously defended the principle of academic freedom. “Attacking science is nonsense; science is not an opinion,” he declared. At a time when research is under threat, particularly across the Atlantic, this is a crucial issue for both sovereignty and democracy—a point that the ENS de Lyon institutional project also strongly advocates. Thierry Dauxois emphasized the importance of research funding and, in particular, the need to avoid a hiring freeze for young researchers, as research is a productive investment in the country’s future. The importance of the relationship that the CNRS must foster with higher education institutions was also reiterated. It is central.

Thierry Dauxois joined the very first graduating class of ENS de Lyon in 1987. In 1990, he passed the agrégation exam in Physics with flying colors before beginning his doctoral thesis under the supervision of Michel Peyrard at the University of Dijon and, in part, at Los Alamos. He returned to ENS de Lyon in 1994 when he joined the CNRS as a research fellow. His work focuses on statistical physics and nonlinear phenomena in general, with a particular interest in dynamical systems. Building on his early work in biophysics, he turned his attention to solitons—of which tsunamis are an example—then to systems with long-range interactions (such as those in astrophysics), as well as to the field of oceanography. His research combines theoretical and experimental approaches in equal measure, along with numerical computation. Throughout his career, marked by an international dimension with numerous collaborations in Italy, India, Cameroon, and the United States, Thierry Dauxois has held various positions: director of the Second Year Master’s degree program in Physics at ENS de Lyon from 2005 to 2011; chair of the Theoretical Physics Section within the National Committee for Scientific Research (CoNRS) from 2010 to 2012; and director of the Physics Laboratory at ENS de Lyon from 2012 to 2020. He was then appointed Vice President for Research at ENS de Lyon, before joining the Management Board of the CNRS Institute of Physics in 2021.

Thierry Dauxois is the third alumnus of the School to head the CNRS, following Guy Aubert in 1994 (former director of ENS de Lyon from 1987 to 1994) and Catherine Bréchignac in 2006. Those who have worked alongside him during the nearly 30 years he has spent at the institution—first as a student, then as a researcher and professor—know of his commitment to public research, the civil service, and a sense of community. The entire community of ENS de Lyon and its alumni extend their warmest congratulations and best wishes for success in this role, at a critical moment for the CNRS and, more broadly, for higher education and research. The CNRS, despite certain budgetary challenges, is a solid and vigorous organization, essential to the smooth functioning of research in France and beyond.