Ion Mobilty Spectrometer - Time of Flight - Mass Spectrometer

GSG Meß- und Analysengeräte GmbH (Germany) has launched the IMS-TOF-MS “si@mass TOF” - the first commercialised traditional Ion Mobilty Spectrometer - Time of Flight – Mass Spectrometer.

The high resolution atmospheric drift tube IMS instrument “si@mass TOF” with a resolving power of 50 - 70 provides a twodimensional separation based on size and mass. In IMS-TOF/MS, ions are separated on the size-to-charge ratio in the IMS part and the mass-to-charge ratio in the TOF/MS region.

Traditional IMS technique exhibits the special feature that the gaseous ions moving through a drift tube with a homogeneous, continuous electric field in the presence of neutral gas molecules. The time it takes the ions to travel down the drift tube is directly proportional to the size they have in shape. Thus, the cross section of the ions can be calculated down to a few angstroms.

The IMS/MS technique expands into more and more applications in different research areas and the application areas are still growing. It provides solutions for instance in proteomics, metabolomics, lipidomics, whole-protein analysis, small-molecule investigations, tissue imaging, and polymer characterization. Particularly the ability to isolate conformers and isomers by IMS/MS affects a number of biological and pharmaceutical research areas.

The IMS-TOF/MS software provides the user a third dimension in sample separation. The “si@mass TOF” comes standard with electrospray ionisation (ESI) source for coupling to liquid chromatography (LC). Alternatively, it can be provided with a corona discharge ion source for chemical ionisation of gaseous samples, enabling use as a detector for gas chromatography (GC). A collision induced dissociation (CID) is optional included after the IMS for structural analysis of IMS separated ions.

IMS-TOF/MS instruments are delivered with flexible, general-purpose software bundle that controls IMS-TOF electronics, experiment timing, and data collection. Acquisition and data storage are optimised for speed and multi-dimensional experiments. The software is ideal for hyphenation of the instrument with other separation methods.