Chris Freye, Ph.D., is a staff scientist in the High Explosives Science and Technology group at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he uses GC×GC, UHPLC, UHPLC-IMS, and high-resolution mass spectrometry to study how high explosives and plastic-bonded explosives (PBXs) change over time.

In this episode, Chris discusses his path from rock climbing in the Pacific Northwest to a PhD under GC×GC pioneer Robert Synovec at the University of Washington, and how that training shaped his current work at Los Alamos. He walks through the unique safety and security realities of national lab chemistry, from handling gram-scale samples to retrieving material from magazines holding thousands of pounds of explosives, and explains why sample prep always starts with the scientific question rather than the instrument.

The conversation covers why LC has long been the gold standard for explosives analysis and why it only tells half the story, how his team developed vacuum GC×GC to elute volatile explosives before they decompose, and the accidental discovery that a GC inlet can double as an aging oven — compressing three-year explosive aging studies into two hours. Chris also explains why his team started finding PFAS in high explosives materials through fluoropolymer binders, the extraction method they had to invent after standard EPA protocols failed, and how chemometric tools like Alteration Analysis and Fisher ratio analysis let them distill billions of data points into a simple yes-or-no answer about chemical change.

Whether you work in chromatography, mass spectrometry, materials science, or just want a rare look inside high-explosives research, this episode covers the instrumentation, the chemistry, and the day-to-day reality of the work.