John Fenn, who shared the 2002 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, died on 10 December in Richmond, Virginia, aged 93. In the late 1980s, he developed a way to gently separate clumped proteins into individual, aerosolized molecules, called electrospray ionisation.

This method, when combined with mass spectrometry, gave scientists a tool to quickly identify a protein via its mass and helped launch the field of proteomics.

In 2005, Fenn lost a legal battle to Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, where he developed the technique, over the patent rights. He moved to Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond in 1994.

Virginia Commonwealth University press release.

Image courtesy of Virginia Commonwealth University.