Fast algorithm for time decay estimation with applications to electrostatic ion beam traps

Abstract

The ability of peptide trapping in an electrostatic ion beam trap (EIBT) is used for the measurement of renin substrate lifetime dependence from the pressure. The time decay estimation is traditionally obtained by optimization of nonlinear curve-fitting in the least-squares sense. This paper presents a novel algorithm to address this problem, using a numerical differentiation method as the basis for lifetime estimation. Simulations results show that the proposed method provides results similar to those obtained with the classical approach, but is faster by about two orders of magnitude. An experimental result is detailed, which shows the adequacy of this algorithm for the real-life monitoring of decay measurements, not only for EIBT, but also for other processes such as luminescence where exponential decay is involved.