Alain Valette presented his thesis, on the K-theory of certain group C*-algebras, in 1983 at the Free University of Brussels. He was a research assistant at Brussels from 1980 to 1984, and a senior research assistant from 1986 to 1988. Since 1988 he is a full professor at University Neuchâtel. Dr. Valette is the author of seven books, including elementary number theory, finite group theory, and Ramanujan graphs, with G. Davidoff and P. Sarnak (Cambridge, 2003); Proper Group actions and the Baum-Connes conjecture, with G. Mislin (Birkhäuser, 2003); Kazhdans property (T), with B. Bekka and P. de la Harpe (Cambridge, 2008). He is a member of the scientific committee of the Bernouilli Centre at EPFL, and represents the Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) on the board of IHES.