Team — Isotoparium

Lab retreat (Oct 2024) at Mt. San Jacinto State Park for a weekend of hiking and science talks!

Current Team

CV  |  GS  |  RG

Awards: NSF CAREER, Packard, Nininger, Crosby, LPI, McCormick
tissot@caltech.edu

François Tissot

Professor of Geochemistry & Investigator, Heritage Medical Research Institute

As an isotope chemist and broad-based Earth scientist, my research focuses on both cosmochemical and geochemical problematics, such as (i) the evolution of the Solar System through the isotopic characterization of meteorites and their inclusions, (ii) the reconstruction of paleo-redox conditions in the ocean/atmosphere system, and (iii) the potential of non-traditional stable isotopes for studying magmatic processes.

These elemental and isotopic investigations are carried out by combining wet chemistry sample preparation in an ultra-clean laboratory environment, high-precision isotopic analyses on Multi-Collector Inductively Coupled Mass Spectrometer (MC-ICPMS) ± Laser ablation, and interpretation of the data using physically based models.

Trained as an engineer in Geology at the ENSG (France), I received my Ph.D in Geochemistry and Cosmochemistry from the University of Chicago in 2015, and was the W.O. Crosby Postdoctoral Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2016-2017. I joined Caltech in 2018 where I created the Isotoparium: a state-of-the-art facility for high-precision isotope studies.

When science allows, I enjoy climbing, answering the many questions of my two young daughters, photography and Mel Brooks’ musicals.

Students and Postdocs