Peter R. Griffiths Named Recipient of the 2012 ANACHEM Award

The Association of Analytical Chemists (ANACHEM) organization and the Federation of Analytical Chemistry and Spectroscopy Societies (FACSS) have selected Peter R. Griffiths as the recipient of the 2012 ANACHEM Award. The award was established in 1953, and is presented annually to an outstanding analytical chemist based on activities in teaching, research, administration, or other activity that has advanced the art and science of the field.

Griffiths received his doctorate in physical chemistry at Oxford University (Oxford, UK) and did postdoctoral research at the University of Maryland (College Park, Maryland). He then worked as product specialist at Digilab (Holliston, Massachusetts), where the first FT‐IR spectrometer of the modern era was developed. He was subsequently appointed as manager of analytical services at Sadtler Research Laboratories in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (now the Bio‐Rad Informatics Division). He started his academic career at Ohio University (Athens, Ohio), where he ultimately achieved the rank of distinguished professor. He then moved to the University of California, Riverside before being appointed chair of the chemistry department of the University of Idaho (Moscow, Idaho), where he is now professor emeritus.

Griffiths has worked in many different aspects of vibrational spectroscopy since 1964. The research in his laboratory has been largely centered on the application of infrared and Raman spectrometry to the solution of problems of analytical, environmental and structural chemistry. Topics on which he has published extensively include various types of infrared reflection spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, chemometrics and data processing, development of instrumentation for infrared spectroscopy (especially FT‐IR), hyphenated techniques, open‐path atmospheric monitoring and surface‐enhanced infrared and Raman spectroscopy. He is the author of over 300 refereed papers and 45 book chapters, and has written or edited 12 books on various aspects of vibrational spectroscopy, including Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometry (two editions) and the five‐volume Handbook of Vibrational Spectroscopy.