Chemistry Professor Honored with Award

The College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences and the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry are pleased to announce that Dr Paul Farnsworth has received the Distinguished Service Award from the Society for Applied Spectrometry (SAS).

The award was formally presented at the 2009 Federation of Analytical Chemis­try and Spectroscopy Societies meeting in Lousiville, Ky., on October 20th. Farnsworth received the award primar­ily in recognition of his twelve years of service as editor of Applied Spectroscopy, a journal published by the SAS. In addi­tion to serving as the journal’s editor since 1997, he has also sat on several national committees and chaired the local Inter­mountain section of the society. Though he began his research career studying energy transport and excitation mechanisms in inductively coupled plas­mas used as emission sources, he has slowly evolved into a mass spectrometrist. However, he still maintains his interest in optical spectroscopy. His work on ion transport in ICP-MS has been recognized twice with the Spectrochmica Acta Atomic Spectroscopy Award, first in 1998 and again in 2006. He also received the Les­ter W. Strock Award from the SAS and the Utah Award from the American Chemical Society in 2006. Farnsworth received his Bachelor’s de­gree from BYU in 1977 and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin in 1981, prior to conducting post-doctoral research with Dr. Gary Hieftje at Indiana University. He returned to BYU as an assistant profes­sor in 1983 and is currently chair of the university’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. The Society for Applied Spectroscopy is a nonprofit organization “formed to advance and disseminate knowledge and information concerning the art and science of spectroscopy.” Over the course of its 40 years, SAS has remained committed to education and providing quality benefits to their 2,000 members.

By Steve Pierce