David Mainprice held Royal Society European Exchange Fellow at Nantes (France) in 1981/82 before moving to the department of Science of Materials at the University of Oxford (UK) as a Science and Engineering Research Council Fellow from 1983/84. He then moved back to Nantes in 1984 as a Chargé de Recherche CNRS in the group led by Prof. Adolphe Nicolas (Laboratoire de Tectonophysique). In 1986 the group was transferred to Montpellier. In 1991 he became Director de Recherche CNRS. In 1995-96 he was on sabbatical leave at MIT holding the Crosby distinguished lectureship. From 1998 to 2003 he was director of the university service laboratory for electron microscopy. From 1999 to 2003 he was director of the UMR Tectonophysique. He was an elected member of CNRS Comité National section 18 - Terre et planètes telluriques : structure, histoire, modèles from 2004-2008. In January 2012 was elected fellow of the American Geophysical Union for his fundamental contributions to science. November 2012 he was awarded the "La Prime d'excellence de scientifique du CNRS" for his exceptional contribution to research.
Research interests
Crystallographic preferred orientation and anisotropic physical properties
Ab-inito atomic modelling of crystals and their physical properties
Experimental measurement of physical properties
Experimental deformation at high temperature and pressure
Microstructure - scanning and transmission electron microscopy
Electron back scattered diffraction (E.B.S.D.)