Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

John Herbert Beynon

2003; Wiley; Volume: 18; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1002/rcm.1300

1097-0231

Robert Boyd,

Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Biomedical Research

John Beynon has just turned 80 years old. This does not seem possible to me, as I first met John at Purdue in 1975 when his vigour and intellectual powers were at their peak; somehow that first impression has stayed with me. As a matter of fact the impression was reinforced just a few months ago when my wife and I visited John and Yvonne (see Figs. 1 and 2) in Swansea. I had last seen John in hospital shortly after his severe stroke, and the results of his characteristic steely determination and of the gentle ministrations of Yvonne were apparent. He was walking, and could drive his specially equipped car. And, no surprise, although his body was now frailer than in 1975, that internal fire was still ablaze. He has extended his lifelong interest in photography of insects and flowers to include manipulation of some of his more striking photographs by computer to create some striking new images. Three of these are reproduced here. Figure 3 shows the original photograph of a wasp superimposed on one of John's computer-manipulated images, and Fig. 4 is another image generated from a small area of the same photograph; Fig. 5 is an image generated from a photograph of a flower. Also unimpaired is John's sense of humour. The photographs reproduced as Figs. 6 and 7, taken in John and Yvonne's new home in late August, show first John bravely coaxing out a smile at one of my lame jokes, and then my reaction to one of the Beynon specials. John Beynon. Yvonne Beynon. Photograph of a wasp superimposed on a computer-generated image based on manipulation of part of the photograph. Computer-generated image based on manipulation of part of the wasp photograph in Fig. 3. Computer-generated image based on manipulation of part of a photograph of a flower. John forcing a smile for one of Boyd's feeble jokes: Swansea, August 2003. Boyd reaction to a Beynon special. During my career on the faculty of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Guelph, I spent two sabbatical years with John Beynon at Swansea. The first of these was in 1975/1976, and was intended to educate me into mass spectrometry as a new research direction for me since shock-tube research was reaching the end of its more productive years. As it turned out I did indeed get myself educated, and we also managed to publish several papers together, a non-trivial feat since John's new instrument did not arrive till after I had returned to my job in Canada! One of the things we worked on together was development of new techniques for obtaining MS/MS data of various kinds using double-focusing instruments. This work was motivated by the work of Graham and Evans on the so-called linked-scan at fixed E2/V, that provided fragment ion spectra of a mass-selected precursor ion but was subject to severe problems from ion source detuning. I had taken it on myself to see whether I could discover a complementary linked-scan that would reveal all parents of a mass-selected fragment ion without the detuning problems of the old Barber-Elliott scan (V-scan); after about four pages of tortuous logic I did succeed in deducing that a scan at fixed B2/E should work. John seemed pleased with this, and undertook to write something up and think about it during a trip to London he and Yvonne were making by train. On his arrival back in Swansea he did not go straight home, but burst into my small guest-scientist's office, just bubbling with what can only be called boyish enthusiasm: “I've cracked it”. Basically, he had cut to the chase, right past my clumsy approach, by a simple algebraic device in which he introduced a variable (restricted to integral values for practical reasons) that described the relationship between the field ratios and the mass ratios of the precursor-fragment ions. This was later developed further into what amounted to an existence theorem for linked-scan relationships that nicely complemented the generalized graphical approach that was being developed (unknown to us) by Mike Lacey and Colin Macdonald in Australia. (And of course the particular B/E scan was also being developed simultaneously by Keith Jennings and his colleagues, again unknown to us.) But the point of this story is the typical way in which all the circumlocutory baggage of my four pages was swept away by a simple (once John had produced it!) insight. My second sabbatical with John at Swansea took place in 1984/1985. For reasons now lost to human understanding, we developed a Friday night ritual whereby John and I and one of John's good local friends (John Squires) had decided that we would discover the best pub in Swansea for draught dark mild beer. (Anyone acquainted with Swansea will realize that the problem of the number of pubs involved is something of a self-referring question, the answer to which is likely a Gödel Number.) So our ritual was that John Squires would pick us up, we'd try one beer in each of two pubs, then park the car for retrieval the next morning, spend the balance of the evening in the Swansea Rugby Club, and take a taxi home. After several weeks of this we noticed that the barmen in the pubs were looking sideways at us and were becoming decidedly guarded in their conversation with us. After some time John had had enough of this, and John Squires volunteered to ask what was the problem. It turned out that barmen around the city had noticed us three ill-assorted characters buzzing around the city from pub to pub, drinking just one beer in each (not a Swansea tradition!). They had decided that we were police officers checking up for breaches of licensing regulations. Understandably they had identified John as the gaffer, John Squires as his right arm, and myself as the hard man brought down from Scotland to handle any rough stuff. Of course the two Johns thought this was hilarious, as did I until I realized that I would henceforth be a target for any real hard man anxious to try his luck with the cop. I was then 47 years old, and had basically lost all the speed of my youth (and by speed I mean speed over the first 30 yards!). The real point of this story for me, though, is the way in which John could make himself completely at home without a second thought in a working man's pub, just as naturally as he did at some very grand ceremonial occasion at a university or at the Royal Society. These sabbaticals were supplemented by several shorter visits over the years, funded by a NATO grant. As a result I developed close friendships with several of John's Swansea colleagues, including Sid Davies, Des Thomas, Maisie Player, the late Frank Harris, Chris Porter, Mike Guilhaus, etc., and especially Gareth Brenton who has been a tower of strength in the Swansea group for many years while still carving out a distinguished career for himself. In 1988, Gareth and I acted as guest editors for a special issue of what was then the International Journal of Mass Spectrometry and Ion Physics (Vol. 88, 1988) to honour John's 65th birthday. (Figure 8 shows Gareth presenting John with a bound copy of that special issue.) The response to our requests for contributions to the luminaries of the mass spectrometry world was overwhelming. Also in that festschrift we wrote an introductory tribute to John that we feel is difficult to repeat. Accordingly, on the event of John's 80th birthday, we decided to not organize yet another such festschrift, but to publish in this journal that John founded some more personal memories of his career. I am very grateful to the friends and colleagues whose contributions are included here. On a sad note, John's longtime colleague and friend, A. E. (Bert) Williams, passed away before he could respond to a request for some less reputable recollections of the pioneering days at ICI. Some of Bert's memories of his 16 years with John were published in Organic Mass Spectrometry 18 (1983) 506–508. Gareth Brenton presenting John with a bound copy of the Festschrift honouring his 65th birthday, published in International Journal of Mass Spectrometry and Ion Physics: Swansea, 1988. Before passing the platform to others in this memoir of a remarkable career, it seemed appropriate to add a few photographs (see Figs. 9-22) that mark some of the more notable events in John's professional career as well as some more personal moments (a picture is worth a thousand words!). Most of these photographs were provided by John and Yvonne themselves, but John Bowie very kindly sent the photograph taken at the International Conference held at Swansea in 1985, and the photograph taken outside the ugly mask store in Minneapolis was taken by Richard Caprioli, who did not wish to be seen in such disreputable company. In addition, Gareth Brenton's account of the Swansea years is based on the group photographs, reproduced in Gareth's contribution. John working on the RMH2 instrument early in his time at Purdue. John persuading the ZAB to jump through hoops; late 1970s. John with Ted Ast; Lubljana, 1979. John and Yvonne at the 1979 Hasler Award presentation. Speakers at the 1987 ACS Field and Franklin Award presentation. Left-to-right: Rob Dunbar, Bob Boyd, Tom Baer, Mike Bowers, John Beynon, Frank Field, Graham Cooks, Fred McLafferty. John at the Institute of Materia Medica, Shanghai, 1985. John in his office: Swansea, 1986. Group picture of plenary and keynote speakers at the International Mass Spectrometry Conference, Swansea, 1985. (Too many to name). John as a field hockey player. Richard Caprioli's infamous photograph of John and friends (from left: Ray March, Gareth Brenton, Urs Schlunegger, John, Roger Morgan, Chris Porter, Bob Boyd) taken in front of an ‘ugly mask’ store in Minneapolis, said to be a suitable locale for this picture. Rhythm man John in a cutting contest with a French jazz band on a ship on Lac Leman, on the way to the Swiss Mass Spectrometry meeting; September 1991. The photographer photographed. Also a cook? Official sweeper-upper at the Swansea Rugby Club. Last word: Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry started in 1987 as a very thin (7 issues, 135 pages) publishing venture, driven by John's belief that mass spectrometry was at the beginning of a phase of explosive growth and development and that fast publication could be a significant contribution. This was long before e-mail, the Internet, on-line publication, etc. Now, at the time of writing, Volume 17 seems likely to exceed 2500 pages in 24 issues. On John's 80th birthday it seems only fitting that the journal he founded should publish a tribute to his prescience and judgment in this, as in so many other things during his long career. Furthermore, in recognition of John's leadership role in promoting publication of mass spectrometry research work, the publisher of RCM (John Wiley and Sons) has agreed to fund an annual award, to be named the John Beynon RCM Award. Details of this new award were determined through discussions with the RCM Editorial Board, and can be found at the front of this issue.