David Murray Goodall died on the 15th January 2025 after a short illness at the age of 83. Over the last few years I have written several obituaries for separation scientists who have achieved great heights and those I admire in their fields. This is the hardest obituary I have written, not only because I hold David in high regard as a scientist and a person, but also because David nurtured me during my DPhil and helped me become the scientist I am today. I hope I can adequately convey the detail of the man he was, what he meant to the many people he worked with and whose careers he impacted.

David was born in Manchester on the 10th March 1941 and attended the University of Oxford first for his BA in Chemistry (1959-1962) and then his DPhil in Physical Chemistry under the guidance of Professor Ronald P. Bell where he studied reaction kinetics (1962-1965). He then moved to Cornell University in New York for a post-doctoral position with Professor Franklin A. Long which was funded through a Fulbright scholarship (1965-1966). In 1963, the University of York was founded and the department of chemistry (founded 1965) quickly set about identifying talented young academics to work there. David joined the chemistry department in 1966 as a lecturer in physical chemistry. He became a Reader in 1994 and a full Professor a few years later in 2001. He retired from the University in 2007, but left as an Emeritus Professor and maintained his working relationship with the University through his spin-out company Paraytec, working with Mebs Surve and Ed Bergstrom, both former DPhil students of David. At Paraytec, David was both a Director and the Chief Scientific Officer where he was instrumental in developing UV imaging and fluorescence detection for applications in biopharmaceutical and drug formulation development.

During his career, David published 160 articles and patents. He was also awarded The Chromatographic Society Jubilee medal for his design and development of an optical rotation LC chiral detector in 1991 (working with his DPhil student David Lloyd). In 1999 he was also recognised by the Royal Society of Chemistry with the Analytical Separations Methods award for his “significant contribution to the theory and development of capillary electrophoresis, chiral analysis and miniaturised detectors”. However, the statistics of David’s publications and the breadth of them do not paint the full picture of the man. He was an excellent communicator, teacher and mentor. He was kind, perennially optimistic and his glass was always half-full. His academic prowess was razor sharp and never dimmed. He was the type of person who would quickly grasp the subject matter in any conversation or presentation – always asking probing questions that everyone would benefit from knowing the answer to. He was always humble and grateful for people’s time – be it an undergraduate student or a well-known scientist. It was his inquisitive nature that lead to his vast and diverse range of friends, colleagues and collaborators. He saw every conversation as an opportunity and this led him to work over many areas such as pharmaceuticals, food, electronics and medical diagnostics. David was also the type of man who would support and praise his students whenever the occasion merited it. He had an infectious enthusiasm which would push you to do more or try something new in your research to earn his praise. On several occasions at conferences he would draw me into conversations with academics whom I had placed on scientific pedestals and these types of interactions ultimately led me to spend time in the laboratories of luminaries like Professors Csaba Horvath at Yale University and John Stobaugh at Kansas University in the US, as well as attending many international conferences – something I couldn’t have dreamed of when I first started my doctorate. His organisation of the famous York university capillary electrophoresis courses in the 1990s opened up connections to industry for all of us students who assisted on these courses. Equally he was always happy to host national and foreign researchers in his laboratory and he established long-lasting relationships with collaborators like Professors Herman Wätzig (University of Braunschweig), Peter Myers (University of Liverpool) and David Perrett (Queen Mary’s London) through those avenues.

I think many people would recognise that David was slightly eccentric. He travelled every day to work at the University on his blue moped with its characteristic ‘hairdryer growl’ (he was not very pleased when one of his doctoral students attached pizza delivery stickers to it in the early ‘90s however). You could always tell when he was curious as his voice would rise in a characteristic high pitch which always made me smile. He was a stickler for English grammar and could argue for hours on the topic. He was always right, and he would probably be rolling his eyes at my prose in this piece.

David had a zest for life. He was an avid reader, loved art in many forms and was attending piano lessons at the university until Autumn last year (to learn to play the piano ‘better’), but one of his greatest passions was travelling. David loved to travel and every year he could be found traversing the UK or abroad visiting friends or collaborators with his wife, Denise. In his last letter to me he spoke about obtaining his German citizenship (David’s mother was German) and I don’t doubt this was in part to help him travel more easily in Europe. His joy at visiting new places to explore, or in returning to places he hadn’t been to for some time was tangible in his letters. Indeed, it was while he was on a European holiday with Denise visiting several principal cities by train in late 2024, that David became ill, in what was ultimately diagnosed as cancer when he returned to the UK.

While I have described David’s achievements and interests, he was foremost a family man. He was married to Denise whom he met aged 18 and they celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary in 2023. They had three children – Simon, Rachel and Sarah and in my correspondence with David, it was always clear how proud he was of his children and their partners achievements which had seen them travel and live all over the UK and abroad. He was equally proud of his grandchildren (Jasper and Ozzy) and his joy at their progress was always at the forefront of his conversation.

I don’t feel as though I can do justice to the legacy of a man who I owe so much to, but I hope I’ve provided a flavour of what he brought to the lives of everyone who knew him. The thoughts of myself, The Chromatographic Society and no doubt all the people who knew him are with Denise and his family at this sad time. There will be a memorial held for David later this year on Saturday 8th March 2025 at the University of York. I know there will be many of us who want to show our appreciation for all he did and the positive impact he had on our lives.

Written by Paul Ferguson (D.Phil supervised by David at University of York 1994-1997)