Royston "Roy" Goodacre is Chair in

Biological Chemistry Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology an ...

at the

University of Liverpool , mottoeng = These days of peace foster learning , established = 1881 – University College Liverpool1884 – affiliated to the federal Victoria Universityhttp://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/2004/4 University of Manchester Act 200 ...

. With training in both

Microbiology Microbiology () is the scientific study of microorganisms, those being unicellular (single cell), multicellular (cell colony), or acellular (lacking cells). Microbiology encompasses numerous sub-disciplines including virology, bacteriology, ...

and

Pyrolysis The pyrolysis (or devolatilization) process is the thermal decomposition of materials at elevated temperatures, often in an inert atmosphere. It involves a change of chemical composition. The word is coined from the Greek-derived elements ''p ...

Mass Spectrometry Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that is used to measure the mass-to-charge ratio of ions. The results are presented as a '' mass spectrum'', a plot of intensity as a function of the mass-to-charge ratio. Mass spectrometry is u ...

, Goodacre runs a multidisciplinary

Metabolomics Metabolomics is the scientific study of chemical processes involving metabolites, the small molecule substrates, intermediates, and products of cell metabolism. Specifically, metabolomics is the "systematic study of the unique chemical fingerprin ...

and

Raman spectroscopy Raman spectroscopy () (named after Indian physicist C. V. Raman) is a spectroscopic technique typically used to determine vibrational modes of molecules, although rotational and other low-frequency modes of systems may also be observed. Raman s ...

research group in the Institute of Systems, Molecular and Integrative Biology (ISMIB), and leads ISMIB’s Centre for Metabolomics Research and the Laboratory for Bioanalytical Spectroscopy.

Early life and education

Goodacre was born in

Changi Changi () is a Planning Areas of Singapore, planning area located in the geographical region of Tanah Merah, Singapore, Tanah Merah in the East Region, Singapore, East Region of Singapore. Sharing borders with Pasir Ris and Tampines to the west, ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

, and was educated from 1978 at the

Monmouth School Monmouth School for Boys is a public school (independent day and boarding school) for boys in Monmouth, Wales. The school was founded in 1614 with a bequest from William Jones, a successful merchant and trader. The School is run as a trust, ...

, in Wales, where he went on to study Biology, Chemistry and Mathematics at 'A' level. He received a 2i-class honours degree in

from the

University of Bristol The University of Bristol is a Red brick university, red brick Russell Group research university in Bristol, England. It received its royal charter in 1909, although it can trace its roots to a Society of Merchant Venturers, Merchant Venturers' sc ...

, where he was a student at Badock Hall Halls of residence at the University of Bristol, and remained to study for a PhD in pyrolysis-MS for bacterial identification with the bacteriologist Dr Roger Berkeley at the

, defending his thesis in 1992. While in Bristol he met his wife: they married in 1991, celebrating 30 years of marriage in 2021, and have one daughter.

Career

Following his PhD, Goodacre took up a postdoctoral research position at

Aberystwyth University Aberystwyth University ( cy, Prifysgol Aberystwyth) is a Public university, public Research university, research university in Aberystwyth, Wales. Aberystwyth was a founding member institution of the former federal University of Wales. The universi ...

between 1992 and 1995, and began his own research laboratory in 1995, with the award of a

Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of one of the predecessors of Glax ...

Research Career Development Fellowship, which he held until 1999, when he received tenure as a lecturer in

. He moved to

UMIST , mottoeng = By Knowledge and Work , established = 1824 , closed = 2004 (merged into newly formed University of Manchester in 2004) , affiliation = , endowment = , officer_in_charge = , chairman ...

, which merged to become the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The university owns and operates majo ...

, first as Reader in Analytical Science (Dept. of Chemistry, 2003–05) and then as Professor of Biological Chemistry, from 2005–2018. Goodacre was then recruited to the

to become Director of the Centre for Metabolomics Research (2018-). Goodacre is the founder and current Editor-in-Chief of the peer-reviewed scientific journal ''Metabolomics.'' He is an Editorial Advisory Board member for the following journals: '' Analyst'' (2014-); ''Journal of Analytical and Applied Pyrolysis'' (1997-); '' Spectrochimica Acta A: Molecular and Biomolecular Spectroscopy'' (2016-). Goodacre is a Founder and Director of the Metabolomics Society (2005–15, 2020–22) and currently its President. Since 2008 he is also a Director of the Metabolic Profiling Forum. He served as a Committee member of Royal Society of Chemistry's Analytical Division Council (2019-22). Since 2019 Goodacre has been a Trustee of the Analytical Chemistry Trust Fund (ACTF). Goodacre has supervised, and graduated, 53 PhD, 7 MSc and 2 MPhil postgraduate students.

Awards and honours

* The Nils Foss ''Excellence Prize'' 2021. *

FACSS The Fellowship of the Academy of Social Sciences (FAcSS) is an award granted by the Academy of Social Sciences to leading academics, policy-makers, and practitioners of the social sciences. Fellows were previously known as Academicians and used the ...

''Charles Mann Award for Applied Raman Spectroscopy'' (2021). * RSC ''Analytical Division Horizon Prize: Robert Boyle Prize for Analytical Science'' (2021). *The Analytical Scientist ''Power Lists'' in 2019, 2020 and 2021. * RSC ''Bioanalytical Chemistry Award'' (2005). * Recipient of the ''Third Professor S. Ramaseshan Distinguished Lecture''. AstraZeneca Research Foundation India, Bangalore, India (2004).

Research

Goodacre started

research in the early 2000s with

Douglas Kell Douglas Bruce Kell (born 7 April 1953) is a British biochemist and Research Professor of Systems Biology in the Institute of Systems, Molecular and Integrative Biology at the University of Liverpool, and Chief Scientific Officer oEpoch Biodesign ...

. He helped to develop long-term metabolomics which allows fusion of GC-MS and LC-MS data collected over 12–24 months - which is based on mathematical corrections which effectively removes any (unavoidable) chromatographic and mass spectrometry instrumental drift. This approach has been applied to generate profiles from ~1200 normal human serum samples and to investigate human frailty in ageing populations of approx. 2000 individuals. Standardisation in

is important and Goodacre was part of the Metabolomics Standards Initiative (MSI) which help establish metabolite identification reporting standards, which have been very well adopted by the field. He chaired part of the MSI's data analysis workgroup and these minimum reporting standards were published. Goodacre was the first to show that

surface-enhanced Raman scattering Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy or surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) is a surface-sensitive technique that enhances Raman scattering by molecules adsorbed on rough metal surfaces or by nanostructures such as plasmonic-magnetic silica ...

can be used for bacterial identification and to use Spatially Offset Raman spectroscopy for through-container authentication of spirit drinks. As of 2020, Goodacre has authored two international patents, published >400 peer-reviewed research articles and has an H-index of over 100 (see Google Scholar), and edited two books on metabolomics. Goodacre is known for innovative science teaching and scholarship, including the incorporation of music into formal lecture schedules, partly to aid mental well-being.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Goodacre, Roy Alumni of the University of Bristol Alumni of Aberystwyth University Academics of the University of Liverpool Fellows of the Royal Society of Chemistry Fellows of the Learned Society of Wales People educated at Monmouth School for Boys Living people British biochemists Year of birth missing (living people)