David A. Laude

dalaude@mail.utexas.edu

University Distinguished Teaching Professor, Faculty
Interim Dean, College of Natural Sciences

Education

BS, University of the South, 1979
MS, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1981
PhD, University of California - Riverside, 1984

Associate Dean

Dr. Laude is interim dean of the College of Natural Sciences.

He first joined the faculty at The University of Texas at Austin in September 1987 as an assistant professor of chemistry. He received his bachelor's degree in chemistry from the University of the South, a master’s of science from Virginia Tech and a doctorate in analytical chemistry from the University of California at Riverside in 1984. He remained at UC Riverside as a postdoctoral fellow until he joined the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin. In 1996 he was promoted to professor.  Laude was Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education from 1997 until 2010 when he became Senior Associate Dean for Academic Affairs until his appointment as interim dean in 2011. 

Laude's research focuses on analytical mass spectrometry and he is recipient of Beckman Young Investigator and National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Awards. Read more about his research efforts below.

Since joining the College of Natural Sciences dean’s office his efforts have focused on creation of undergraduate programs to support student success. He was instrumental in the development of the UTeach program, the Texas Interdisciplinary Plan and the Freshman Research Initiative. Among his many teaching awards, he is recipient of the Jean M. Holloway Award for Teaching Excellence, the David W. Blunk Memorial Professorship, the Friar Centennial Teaching Fellowship and is a member of the Academy of Distinguished Teachers. He continues to teach the large introductory chemistry class to incoming freshman.

 

Research Synopsis

Until recently, Professor Laude maintained a research program in analytical mass spectrometry in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. The program graduated 22 Ph.D. students and produced 95 refereed publications. Dr. Laude is best known for his research with Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FTICR). His students conducted research on fundamentals of ion motion in trapped ion cells, development of novel FTICR instrumentation and applications in analytical biochemistry. The laboratory developed a unique approach to coupling electrospray ionization with FTICR detection - the use of concentric, differential pumped vacuum chambers. The lab also worked on ion remeasurement techniques in which the same packet of ions is stabilized and remeasured hundreds of times. The group investigated the viability of open trapped ion cells for FTICR. These cells were found to possess a unique and potentially important stability region for trapping ions and permitted the first demonstration of three-dimensional ion stability in a d.c. trapping field. This approach to motional stabilization is radically different and far simpler than other methods now in use in FTICR and suggest a potentially new approach to ion trap mass spectrometry. Finally, efforts to understand the higher-order structure of gas phase biomolecules was performed using electrospray/FTICR. Techniques including H/D exchange, ion dissociation and ion mobility were used to distinguish the effects of charge and structure on gas-phase conformation.