PNNL

Dr. Amanda French is an analytical chemist within the National Security Directorate. She specializes in method development for ultra-trace elemental analysis using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Her research focuses on improving measurements for challenging matrices, advancing ICP-based analyses across the periodic table, and actinide analyses for applications such as nuclear-related measurements and rare-event physics experiments.

Dr. French works on optimizing ICP-MS measurements for nuclear forensics, focusing on the actinides. She has performed fundamental research to assess the use and performance of various reaction gases in the collision reaction cell of triple-quadrupole ICP-MS and is using that knowledge to leverage online chemical separations across the periodic table. She also leverages the fundamental chemistry occurring within the collision reaction cell to obtain thermodynamic and kinetic information, with a primary focus on understanding fundamental reactions of the actinides.

Before joining Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Dr. French was a research fellow with the University of Waikato in Hamilton, New Zealand. In this position, she managed an ICP-MS laboratory with a focus on method development in the use of triple-quadrupole ICP-MS coupled with high-performance liquid chromatography and laser ablation introduction systems.

• Analytical chemistry
• Analytical methods development
• Gas phase chemistry
• Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry
• Mass spectrometry
• Ultra-trace measurements

• PhD in environmental toxicology, Texas Tech University
• BS in chemistry, University of Central Missouri

• American Chemical Society
• American Society for Mass Spectrometry

• Agilent Innovation Award, poster at the 2026 Winter Conference on Plasma Spectrochemistry
• Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Core Value Award for Creativity, 2024