text: Saykally was born in Rhinelander, Wisconsin and educated at University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he received his PhD under R. Claude Woods in 1977. Saykally has been a professor at the University of California, Berkeley since 1979 after postgraduate research at the National Institute of Standards and Technology with Kenneth Melvin Evenson. Saykally and his students have pioneered many important advances in spectroscopy, including velocity modulation spectroscopy of ions, terahertz laser vibration-rotation-tunneling spectroscopy of clusters, infrared photon counting spectroscopy, cavity ringdown spectroscopy, and X-ray spectroscopy of liquid microjets. These have permitted the first detailed study of important textbook molecules, including the hydronium (HO), hydroxide (OH) and ammonium (NH) ions, as well as small water clusters and carbon clusters.
  Recent work includes the spectroscopic determination of a universal water force field via the study of water clusters, the development of femtosecond nonlinear optical molecular imaging methods applied to single nanowire lasers and biological systems, femtosecond Deep UV SHG/SFG studies of liquid electrolyte interfaces, and soft X-ray spectroscopy of liquids and liquid surfaces.