Dr Mark McDowall is Awarded BMSS Life Membership
7th Nov 2025
Life membership of the British Mass Spectrometry Society is a prestigious award given to members of the Society who have made a significant contribution to the practice of mass spectrometry in the UK, whether through providing a reliable and excellent service, expanding the exposure of mass spectrometry beyond the mass spectrometry community, education or, perhaps more importantly, supporting and promoting the Society itself. Life membership provides membership of the Society for the remainder of the member’s life and complimentary registration to the BMSS Annual Meeting.
The recipient of Life Membership at the 45th BMSS Annual Meeting held in Edinburgh in September 2025 was Dr Mark McDowall.
Mark has been involved in the practice and use of mass spectrometry since 1977 when he became an undergraduate student at Cardiff University. After his first degree, Mark continued with a PhD degree in the group of Professor Dai Games at Cardiff University. This renowned mass spectrometry group were pioneers in coupling Liquid Chromatography to Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS). In 1984, after gaining his PhD, Mark received a Royal Society Post-Doctoral Fellowship to continue his LC-MS work at the University of Bonn, Germany.
On Mark’s return to the UK in 1985, he became an LC-MS expert at VG Instruments in Altrincham and stayed with the Company (during their regular name changes) for the rest of his working life. Mark’s keen commercial instincts became apparent and he soon became involved with the marketing department where he was promoted quickly to the post of Marketing Manager. In 1996 VG became Micromass and at this stage Mark became Marketing Director. His next career move was to Senior Business Development Manager in 2002 when Micromass was assimilated into Waters Corporation. In 2014 Mark became an Independent Consultant, always keeping in touch with new developments in mass spectrometry.
During his later years with Waters, Mark spent much time promoting mass spectrometry in developing countries, in particular India. He arranged and carried out many advanced training courses and conferences there to support the local scientists.
Throughout his career, from undergraduate student to current times, Mark has been a regular attendee at BMSS meetings. He was a key member of the BMSS’s IMSC 2003 conference committee for the Edinburgh meeting, ensuring that the conference was professional in terms of logos, web-site, advertising literature and general organisation.
In 2014, towards the end of his career in industry, Mark was elected as a member of the BMSS Committee and became the Meetings Secretary from 2017 to 2022. In this role, he took the annual BMSS Conference and the SIG meetings to a professional level that had not been seen before - balancing the scientific programs with the manufacturers’ exhibition and poster sessions. This included the challenging times of helping drive the Society through the Covid pandemic. From 2022 to 2024 Mark took up the role of Treasurer and put much effort into his responsibility for managing BMSS’s assets. However, not only throughout his time on the BMSS Committee – but also before this time and since his retirement - Mark’s professional input has helped raise the profile and practice of BMSS in many ways. One example of this is Mark’s input to the rejuvenation of the BMSS website, which is a key communication tool for the Society.