Publications

Establishing reliable DESI measurements – its not all about pretty patterns and colours!

This poster relates to work carried out under project O3 – Imaging mass spectrometry of the NMS Chemical and Biological Metrology programme.

Desorption electrospray ionisation (DESI) is a powerful new ionisation technique that can provide highly sensitive mass spectrometry information from surfaces at ambient pressure. The potential of DESI has been demonstrated in a wide range of application areas, including forensics, national security, counterfeit detection of pharmaceuticals and biological analysis. Although a growing amount of research has been devoted to exploring applications, there are presently few studies of the basic fundamental parameters and metrology to improve repeatability, reproducibility and robustness. An understanding of these is crucial to develop DESI as a routine technique suitable for use in industry.

Surface chemical analytical techniques such as secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) and matrix assisted laser desorption ionisation (MALDI) are extremely powerful and are capable of providing high-sensitivity molecular information. However there is an increasing need for imaging mass spectrometry analysis outside of the vacuum environment. This poster describes the information available with DESI in comparison to MALDI or SIMS techniques, and shows the development of DESI for optimal spatially resolved ambient mass spectrometry.

This poster was presented at the Nano-Molecular Analysis for Emerging Technologies meeting held at NPL on 5^th-6^th November and was awarded the first place poster prize.

To download this poster click on the link below (you must be logged in). For further information about topics covered by the poster, please contact the NMS helpdesk at LGC.