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Chemistry professor to receive prestigious scientific award

2025-01-09

Writer(s): Steve Scherer

Professor R. Graham Cooks

Graham Cooks, the Henry Bohn Hass Distinguished Professor of Chemistry, will be awarded the Science History Institute’s 2025 Othmer Gold Medal.

The annual award honors outstanding individuals who have made multifaceted contributions to chemical and scientific heritage through outstanding work in such areas as innovation, entrepreneurship, research, education, public understanding, legislation or philanthropy.

A renowned analytical chemist, Cooks is a pioneer in the field of mass spectrometry, where scientists identify the chemical nature of materials by measuring the masses of their ions, or electrically charged molecules.

He made major contributions to the development of tandem mass spectrometry and invented ambient ionization techniques that paved the way for faster, more portable mass spectrometers.

Cooks and his team have fine-tuned the tools used in molecular imaging for cancer diagnostics and surgery; therapeutic drug monitoring; testing for biomarkers in urine; and the identification of food-borne pathogens, bacteria, pesticides, and explosives residues.

During a 50-year career at Purdue, he has authored more than 1000 scientific papers that have been cited more than 100,000 times with a 150 h-index. Technologies discovered in Cooks’ Aston Labs have generated more than 100 patents and the creation of five companies.

He has directed the doctoral research of 158 graduate students. Fifty of his mentees hold faculty positions in research universities and many others hold positions in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries.

“Professor Cooks’ decades-long commitment to research and mentorship has elevated an already outstanding group of analytical chemists at Purdue, where the College of Science is home to the consensus No. 1 analytical chemistry program in the nation,” said Lucy Flesch, Fredrick L. Hovde Dean in the College of Science.

Cooks will be the 30th recipient of the Othmer Gold Medal, joining a diverse list of former honorees from science and engineering that includes five Nobel Prize winners.

Established in 1997, the medal is sponsored by the Science History Institute (formerly the Chemical Heritage Foundation) and four affiliated organizations: the American Chemical Society, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, The Chemists' Club, and the American section of the Société de Chimie Industrielle.

The award commemorates Donald Othmer (1904-1995), a noted researcher, consultant, editor, engineer, inventor, philanthropist, professor, and coeditor of the Kirk-Othmer Encyclopedia of Chemical Technology.

The award will be presented to Cooks in May 2025 at the Science History Institute in Old City Philadelphia.