James D. Winefordner

This fund was established in 2008 by James D. Winefordner, Ph.D. to support graduate students in the Department of Chemistry.

James was born on December 31, 1931 in Geneso, IL. He attended the University of Illinois and earned a bachelor’s, masters and doctoral degree. He completed his doctorate in philosophy in 1958 before coming to the University of Florida in 1959 as an assistant professor in analytical chemistry. At UF, James changed his focus from electrochemistry to spectrochemical analysis. He became a pioneer in the field, publishing over 870 papers and book chapters and supervising 169 doctoral students.

James has served on the editorial advisory board of several journals and national organizations, as well as serving as the editor of the John Wiley and Sons’ Chemical Analysis Series. He served as the chairman of the Analytical Division of the American Chemical Society and the president of the Society of Applied Spectroscopy. James has won over 30 awards since 1968, including being named the University of Florida Teacher-Scholar of the Year in 1985 and a Blue Key Distinguished Faculty Member in the same year.

His current research projects include the application and modeling of laser-induced plasmas, detection of explosives by laser photo fragmentation and chemiluminescence and characterization of particles by laser fluorescence, laser raman-laser induced plasma emission and mass spectrometry.