FACSS and SAS announce Professor Mike Angel and colleagues as recipients of William F. Meggers Award

Sante Fe, NM. June 30, 2012.

The Society for Applied Spectroscopy (SAS) and the Federation of Analytical Chemistry and Spectroscopy Societies (FACSS) are pleased to announce that Drs S. Michael Angel, Nathaniel R. Gomer, Christopher M. Gordon, Paul Lucey, Shiv K. Sharma, and J. Chance Carter have been awarded the 2012 William F. Meggers Award for their paper entitled:

“Raman Spectroscopy Using a Spatial Heterodyne Spectrometer: Proof of Concept”
Volume 65, Issue 8, (August 2011), pp. 849-857

Since 1960, a single article has been selected each year from the Journal (Applied Spectroscopy) for citation as the most outstanding. This award was initiated through the courtesy of SPEX Industries, Inc. The award included a cash honorarium. In 1968, the name of the Journal Award was changed in order to commemorate the outstanding spectroscopist; William F. Meggers. In 1978, the sponsorship of the Meggers Award was transferred from SPEX Industries to the Spectroscopy Society of Pittsburgh. In 1991, the award was turned over to the Leco Corporation. The award consists of a plaque and an honorarium in the amount of $500 which is to be shared by all authors on the paper.

This award is given annually to the author(s) of an outstanding paper appearing in the SAS’s journal Applied Spectroscopy. Professor Angel, University of South Carolina, Columbia will accept the 2012 William F. Meggers award on behalf of his coauthors at SciX 2012.

Michael Angel received his PhD in analytical chemistry from North Carolina State University in 1985. Following graduation he went to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory where he was a post-doc in the group of Tomas Hirschfeld, then an Environmental scientist (1986-1989), and subsequently held the position of Group leader – Advanced Measurement Science Group – Environmental Sciences Division (1989-1993). In August of 1993, he took up a position as an associate professor of chemistry at the University of South Carolina. In 2001 he was promoted to full professor and in 2005 became the Fred M. Weissman Palmetto Chair in Chemical Ecology (the position he currently holds).

Professor Angel’s recent honors and awards include, a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory – Physics and Advanced Technologies Directorate Award (2006), a University of South Carolina Education Foundation Research Award for Science, Mathematics, and Engineering (2009), voted South Carolina Chemist of the Year by the South Carolina Section of the American Chemical Society, a 2011 FACSS Innovation Award, and election as a Fellow to the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

His current research interests include optical instrumentation for remote and in-situ measurements, and remote and in-situ spectroscopic measurements in extreme environments.

The award will be formally presented by SAS president Mary Kate Donais during the SAS’s Wine and Cheese Awards Reception on Tuesday, October 2, 2012 at the national meeting of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy, SciX - The Great Scientific Exchange, presented by FACSS which will be held in Kansas City, MO. The reception and awards ceremony begin at 7:30 p.m.

Professor Angel will present the Meggers Award Plenary Lecture entitled “Spatial Heterodyne Raman Spectrometer for Wide-Area Standoff Detection” on Thursday October 4th and a separate half-day award symposium of five invited presentations will be held following his lecture at the SciX conference.