Rate My Professor Richard O'Hair

Richard A. J. O'Hair is Professor in the School of Chemistry at the University of Melbourne, Faculty of Science, a position he has held since July 2006. Prior to this promotion, he served as Associate Professor and Reader from January 2003 to June 2006 and Senior Lecturer from August 1996 to December 2002 at the same school. He was Head of the School of Chemistry from 2020 to 2022. Earlier, O'Hair was Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry at Kansas State University from August 1993 to May 1996. He has undertaken several visiting research appointments, including Senior Humboldt Fellow with Professor Konrad Koszinowski at Georg-August-Universität Göttingen from September 2016 to April 2017, multiple visits as Visiting Research Professor or CNRS Research Fellow at Laboratoire de Spectrometrie Ionique et Moleculaire, Université Claude Bernard Lyon, France, Visiting Research Professor at Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris, France in 2009, and U.S. Department of Energy Faculty Fellow at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in 1996. His postdoctoral experience includes positions at the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, University of Colorado at Boulder from July 1991 to July 1993, Department of Organic Chemistry, University of Adelaide, and Chemistry Department, University of Wollongong.

O'Hair received his B.S. with Top 1st Class Honours in 1986, Ph.D. in 1991, and D.Sc. in 2005 from the University of Adelaide. His research expertise encompasses mass spectrometry, organometallics, and biological molecules, with a focus on gas-phase ion chemistry. He is a founding Chief Investigator of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Free Radical Chemistry and Biotechnology and leads the O'Hair Group at the Bio21 Molecular Science & Biotechnology Institute. Notable awards include the ANZSMS Medal in 2021, Senior Humboldt Fellowship in 2016, election as Fellow of the Australian and New Zealand Society for Mass Spectrometry in 2014, Morrison Lecturer in 2007, David Syme Research Prize and Gilmour Research Award in 2002, Selby Research Award in 1998, and U.S. Department of Energy Faculty Research Fellowship in 1996. O'Hair serves as Associate Editor of the Journal of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry and on the editorial advisory boards of Organometallics, Chinese Journal of Chemistry, Zeitschrift für Physikalische Chemie, Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry, International Journal of Mass Spectrometry, European Journal of Mass Spectrometry, and Mass Spectrometry Reviews. Key publications feature 'Organometallic Gas-Phase Ion Chemistry and Applications in Reactivity and Catalysis Studies' (Mass Spectrometry Reviews, 2021), 'The 3D quadrupole ion trap mass spectrometer as a complete chemical laboratory for fundamental and applied studies' (Chemical Communications, 2006), and 'Gas-Phase Synthesis of the Homo and Hetero Organocuprate Cluster Cations' (Journal of the American Chemical Society, 2008).