Graphical aids and scanning modes for tandem mass spectrometry

Abstract

In tandem mass spectrometry, where typically one analyser is used to study the reactions of ions selected by another andyser from a mixture teaving the ion source, the output contains an additional dimension of information compared to that from conventional mass spectrometry. me increase in dimensionality tends to make the results less easy to assimilate and interpret, but the diflticulties may be overcome in large measure by presenting the results in an appropriate graphical form. This review deals with the use of graphical representations of three-drm * ensional data to display the results of experiments in tandem mass spectrometry. Perspective diagrams or contour map can be used to show the identity of the parent and daughter ions for all of the reactions occurring in a tandem mass spectrometer, including reactions of positive ions, reactions of negative ions and charge inversion reactions. A graphical approach is particularly valuable when double focusing mass spectrometers are used for tandem mass spectrometry, because it can make it much easier to establish the ongin of the ions contrhthg to an observed peak and thus to determine whether interference is occurring. Factors bearing on the choice of a coordinate system are dl9cnssed. Relationships characterizing the more important simple and linked scanning modes are listed and the features to which they correspond in two selected coordinate systems are shown. Factors that intluence the resolution of neighbouring peaks by sector field tandem mass spectrometers are discussed.

Complete mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry data field acquisition on the chromatographic time scale by time-resolved ion momentum spectrometry with time-array detection

“…Software was written to present the data in a graphical form with perspective viewing capability. The multidimensionality of the data require its presentation on a two-dimensional x,y plane with intensity projecting into the z direction (28).…”

From physical chemistry to mass spectrometry to government lab manager in half a century

“…But Mike and Colin had a different trick up their sleeve in Canberra that achieved much the same purpose. Their approach (Macdonald & Lacey, ) was an ingenious method of exhibiting a contour plot of ion current profiles as a function of just two well‐chosen functions of the three experimentally controlled parameters V a , V e , and B . This graphical approach was superior to the algebraic method with respect to characterizing the origins of artifact peaks that plagued some of the linked‐scan methods, first investigated by Bruins, Jennings, and Evans ().…”