Marcel Crochet holds an engineering degree from the Université catholique de Louvain (1961) and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley (1966).  He started his academic career at UCL in 1966 and has been a visiting lecturer at a number of foreign universities and research centres. He is the author of a book and 140 publications in the field of rheology and numerical simulation and has been the recipient of several awards for his scientific work. 

Marcel Crochet was Rector of the Université catholique de Louvain from 1995 until 2004 during which time the Fondation Louvain was created in 1998 with Brakeley’s advice.  He was a Consultant with the Minister of higher education and research in the French community of Belgium from 2004 until 2009.  He is a member of several boards related either to industrial research or philanthropic action.  In particular, he chairs the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind children in Brussels and the Agency for Technological Stimulation created by the Walloon Region in 2006.