Richard A Yost (born 31 May 1953 in Martins Ferry) is an American scientist and a professor at the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

. He is best known for his work inventing the triple quadrupole mass spectrometer.The Encyclopedia of Mass Spectrometry: Volume 9: Historical Perspectives, Part B: Notable People in Mass Spectrometry Yost received his BS degree in Chemistry in 1974 from the University of Arizona, having performed undergraduate research in chromatography with Mike Burke and his PhD degree in Analytical Chemistry in 1979 from Michigan State University, having performed graduate research with Chris Enke. He joined the faculty of the University of Florida after his graduate research. He is director of the Southeast Center for Integrated Metabolomics (SECIM) and of NIH's Metabolomics Consortium Coordinating Center (M3C). He is also a Professor of Pathology at both the University of Florida and the University of Utah/ ARUP. His professional activities have focused on research and teaching in analytical mass spectrometry, particularly tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS). His group's research has reflected a unique balance between instrumentation development, fundamental studies, and applications in analytical chemistry. His group has led in the application of novel mass spectrometric methods and techniques to areas such as metabolomics, clinical, biomedical, pharmaceutical, environmental, petrochemical, and forensic chemistry. Yost has supervised the research of well over 100 graduate students during the past 40 years, graduating over 90 PhDs from his group. He has served as PI or Co-PI on grants and contracts totaling over $60M of funding. Research in the group has led to over 210 publications and 25 patents. He is one of the inventors of the

triple quadrupole mass spectrometer A triple quadrupole mass spectrometer (TQMS), is a tandem mass spectrometer consisting of two quadrupole mass analyzers in series, with a (non-mass-resolving) radio frequency (RF)–only quadrupole between them to act as a cell for collision-indu ...

. He won the ASMS Award for Distinguished Contribution to Mass Spectrometry along with Chris Enke in 1993. His research has also been recognized with the 2018 MSACL Award for Distinguished Contribution to Clinical Mass Spectrometry, and the 2019 CPSA Distinguished Analytical Scientist Award. In 2019 he was named the Florida Academy of Sciences Medalist, and was inducted into the

Florida Inventors Hall of Fame The Florida Inventors Hall of Fame is an organization that honors Florida inventors, and is housed in the USF Research Park at the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa. It was founded in 2013 by Dr. Paul R. Sanberg, senior vice president f ...

. His research interests lie in mass spectrometric instrumentation and applications in

analytical chemistry Analytical chemistry studies and uses instruments and methods to separate, identify, and quantify matter. In practice, separation, identification or quantification may constitute the entire analysis or be combined with another method. Separati ...

. This includes the development of new mass spectrometric and

ion mobility Ion mobility spectrometry (IMS) is an analytical technique used to separate and identify ionized molecules in the gas phase based on their mobility in a carrier buffer gas. Though heavily employed for military or security purposes, such as detect ...

instrumentation and techniques and their application to biology and chemistry. Yost has served on the

Florida Board of Governors The Florida Board of Governors is a 17-member governing board that serves as the governing body for the State University System of Florida, which includes all public universities in the state of Florida. After its predecessor, the Florida Board ...

(Regents) and the

University of Florida Board of Trustees The University of Florida Board of Trustees is the governing body of the University of Florida, the Flagship University for the State University System of Florida. The University is located in Gainesville, Florida, United States The United ...

. In 2019 he received the

Distinguished Eagle Scout Award The Distinguished Eagle Scout Award (DESA) is a distinguished service award of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA). It is awarded to an Eagle Scout for distinguished service in his profession and to his community for a period of at least 25 years aft ...

. Yost is currently the president of the

American Society for Mass Spectrometry The American Society for Mass Spectrometry (ASMS) is a professional association based in the United States that supports the scientific field of mass spectrometry. As of 2018, the society had approximately 10,000 members primarily from the US, bu ...

References

University of Arizona alumni Living people Mass spectrometrists University of Florida faculty 1953 births American chemists {{US-chemist-stub