Pierre Potier (22 August 1934 – 3 February 2006) was a French pharmacist as well as a chemist. He held the position of Director of the

Institut de Chimie des Substances Naturelles The Institut de Chimie des Substances Naturelles ("Institute for the chemistry of natural substances"), or ICSN, is part of the Centre national de la recherche scientifique, France's most prominent public research organization. Located at Gif-su ...

(1974 to 2000), as well as a teaching position at the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle. He was a member of the Académie nationale de pharmacie, the Académie des sciences, the

Académie des technologies The National Academy of Technologies of France (''Académie des technologies'') is a learned society, founded in 2000, with an emphasis on technology, and the newest of French academies. In 2007 it acquired the status of ''établissement public'', w ...

and the Academia Europaea.

Biography

Potier attended the Faculté de pharmacie de Paris, and then the

(ICSN) in Gif-sur-Yvette. While working at this institution he collaborated with

Edgar Lederer Edgar is a commonly used English given name, from an Anglo-Saxon name ''Eadgar'' (composed of '' ead'' "rich, prosperous" and ''gar'' "spear"). Like most Anglo-Saxon names, it fell out of use by the later medieval period; it was, however, rev ...

, Derek Barton and

Guy Ourisson Guy Henry Ourisson (March 26, 1926 – November 4, 2006) was a French chemist. He was a member of the Academy of Sciences where he was vice president and then became the president. Awarded the Ernest Guenther Award in 1972 and the Heinrich Wi ...

. In 1968, he lost his wife to breast cancer. This pushed him to work on cancer. For two years from July 1994, he was the director general of research and technology at the ministère français de l'Enseignement supérieur et de la Recherche. In 1998, he received the CNRS gold medal. He was president of the Fondation de la maison de la chimie. Potier was an officer of the Légion d'honneur.

Works

His research was orientated towards understanding and imitating natural synthesis occurring in plants so as to produce the actif compounds in drugs. In the course of his work he perfected the tubuline test, a simple biological test permitting the rapid detection of anti-tumoral drugs. Amongst his discoveries are

vinorelbine Vinorelbine (NVB), sold under the brand name Navelbine among others, is a chemotherapy medication used to treat a number of types of cancer. This includes breast cancer and non-small cell lung cancer. It is given by injection into a vein or by mou ...

(from the '' Catharanthus roseus'') and docetaxel (from '' Taxus baccata''). Docetaxel commercialised under the name Taxotere has become one of the most prescribed anti-cancer drugs in the world and was the number one source of revenue for the CNRS from patents, until the expiry of its patent. All his life he wanted to prove that public research could and should co-operate with the private sector. Potier was convinced that mutual profit could result from this co-operation.

Legacy

The Prix Pierre Potier was created in his honour in 2006 by the Ministry of the Economy and Finance, to encourage innovation in chemical entreprises in favour of durable development. The prize is administered by the Maison de la chimie and

France Chimie France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

Bibliography

* Muriel Le Roux
"Hommage à Pierre Potier, dépasser les limites du présent"
''Rayonnement du CNRS'', no. 41, summer 2006, p. 5-27

References

1934 births 2006 deaths People from Bois-Colombes 20th-century French chemists French pharmacists Members of the French Academy of Sciences Members of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences Officiers of the Légion d'honneur {{France-chemist-stub