René Louiche Desfontaines was both near Tremblay in Brittany on 14 February 1750. He attended the Collège de Rennes and in 1773 went to Paris to study medicine, however he developed an interest in botany which originated from lectrues given at the Jardin des Plantes. He excelled in his new interest and was elected to the French Academy of Sciences in 1783. That same year he embarked on an exploratory expedition to Tunisia and Algeria, and on his return in 1785 brought with him a large collection of plants, of which about 300 were new to science. He also took an interest in ornithology. In 1786 he was appointed professor of botany at the Jardin des Plantes and later became director of the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle.

Desfontaines' great work, 'Flora Atlantica sive historia plantarum quae in Atlante, agro Tunetano et Algeriensi crescunt' was published in 2 volumes in 1798. In 1804 he produced 'Tableau de l'ecole botanique du museum d'histoire naturelle de Paris'. He was also the author of many memoirs on vegetable anatomy and physiology and descriptions of new genera and species.

He established a herbarium, known as the Flora Atlantica, which contained 1480 specimens. This was left to the city of Paris after his death on 16 November 1833.