Stéphane Cordier carried out his thesis work (1993-1996) on the synthesis and crystal chemistry of compounds associating clusters of niobium (or tantalum) with rare earth ions. His PhD work was supervised by Marcel Sergent and Christiane Perrin. Arndt Simon during which he specialized in the synthesis and characterization of fluorides of transition elements, he was recruited at the CNRS in 1999 in the Solid Chemistry and Materials team of the Institute of Chemical Sciences of Rennes. From the 2000s, he set up a new theme in Rennes consisting of using cluster compounds obtained by solid-state chemistry at high temperature as precursors of molecular building blocks for the development of multifunctional hybrid nanomaterials and functionalized surfaces and more recently for the low temperature synthesis of nitrides. Qualified to lead research in 2005 (Habilitation), he was promoted to Research Director in 2010. His research covers a continuum ranging from fundamental research - establishing the relationships between the physical properties of cluster materials and their crystalline and electronic structures - up to research focused on applications such as lighting, display, bio-labeling or photocatalysis. Now deputy head of the Solids Chemistry and Materials team at ISCR, S. Cordier is developing numerous collaborations at national and international level. He is director of the International Research Project CLUSPOM between France and Russia associating the ISCR of Rennes, the ILV of Versailles and the Nikolaev of Inorganic Chemistry of Novosibirsk-Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.