More Mass in One Pass

摘要

Mass spectrometric imaging of complex surfaces can be achieved with ion microscopy. The analytes of different masses are usually separated by time of flight, but many detection schemes are too slow to image several masses simultaneously for the same desorption pulse from the surface. ]ungmann et al. were able to achieve multiplemass imaging by intercepting the ions with a chevron array microchannel plate to generate a pixelated electron signal for the detected region. The electrons were detected with a Timepix chip derived from detectors that are used in high-energy particle detection, allowing a much greater dynamic range of signal intensity than conventional detection. The authors were able to use this instrument to measure multiple mass signals for peptides and proteins, with a range up to 78 kD.