Pullman studied at the Sorbonne, then spent the Second World War as a French Army officer in Africa and the Middle East.

From 1946 to 1954, he worked at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS).

In 1959, he became Director of the Department of Quantum Biochemistry at the Institut de biologie physico-chimique.

They also pioneered the application of quantum chemistry to predicting the carcinogenic properties of aromatic hydrocarbons.

After his 1989 retirement, he wrote The Atom in the History of Human Thought (Paris: Fayard, 1995), a work approachable by general readers.