Christopher Szakal is currently serving as chief of staff for the Material Measurement Laboratory headquarters. Previously, Chris was a research chemist in the Materials Measurement Science Division at NIST since 2006. His professional background is in mass spectrometry, with an emphasis in surface analysis by secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS). His research involves a wide range of topics, including the imaging and quantification of select signatures within individual mammalian and bacterial cells, surface analysis of nanoparticle aggregates as a function of environmental stimuli, inorganic microparticle analysis, and standard method development. In addition to SIMS approaches to characterize the topic areas above,  Christopher has employed ambient ionization mass spectrometry (AI-MS) tools to further expand the chemical information that can be obtained from these systems. These tools include multiple atmospheric pressure-based MS methodologies, such as desorption electrospray ionization (DESI) and atmospheric pressure matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization (AP-MALDI), and advanced instruments containing triple quadrupole and quad-time-of-flight mass analyzers.