Surface induced dissociation with reflectron time-of-flight mass spectrometry

A method of analyzing the mass of a sample, comprising the steps of:

• generating primary ions from said sample;
• selecting individual parent ions from said primary ions;
• focusing a beam of said parent ions along a flight path onto an ion reflectron that comprises one or more reflectron lenses and a movable surface with an adjustable potential, said movable surface adaptable by proper alignment of its position along said flight path, by adjustment of said surface potential, or both, to cause said beam of parent ions to strike said movable surface, so that collision of said parent ions with said movable surface dissociates said parent ions into ion fragments;
• and
• focusing said ion fragments into a detector for separation.

A method of analyzing the mass of a sample, comprising the steps of:

• generating primary ions from said sample;
• selecting individual parent ions from said primary ions;
• focusing a beam of said parent ions along a flight path onto an ion reflectron that comprises one or more reflectron lenses and a movable surface with an adjustable potential and with surface-adsorbed molecules deposited onto said movable surface, said movable surface adaptable by proper alignment of its position along said flight path, by adjustment of said surface potential, or both, to cause some of said parent ions to strike said movable surface and react with said adsorbed molecules to form ion-adsorbate molecules that are thereafter reflected off said movable surface;
• and
• focusing said ion-adsorbate molecules into a detector for separation.

A method of analyzing the mass of a sample, comprising the steps of:

• generating primary ions from said sample;
• selecting individual parent ions from said primary ions;
• focusing a beam of said parent ions along a flight path onto an ion reflectron that comprises one or more reflectron lenses and a movable surface with an adjustable potential,
• sufficiently increasing said movable surface potential so that said parent ions are reflected without striking said movable surface;
• focusing said deflected parent ions into a detector for separation;
• lowering said movable surface potential so that said parent ions strike said movable surface, so that collision of said parent ions with said movable surface dissociates said parent ions into ion fragments;
• and
• focusing said ion fragments into said detector for separation.

A method of characterizing an unknown material using mass selected ion probes, comprising the steps of:

• generating primary ions from a known sample;
• selecting individual ion probes from said primary ions;
• focusing a beam of said ion probes along a flight path onto an ion reflectron that comprises one or more reflectron lenses and a plate with an adjustable potential, said plate having a layer of said unknown material applied thereto and said plate adaptable by proper alignment of its position along said flight path, by adjustment of said plate potential, or both, to cause said beam of ion probes to strike said layer of unknown material on said plate, so that collision of said ion probes with said layer of unknown material causes dissociation said ion probes into ion fragments or formation of adsorbate ions;
• and
• focusing said ion fragments or adsorbate ions into a detector for separation.

A method of analyzing the mass of a sample, comprising the steps of:

• generating primary ions from said sample;
• selecting individual parent ions from said primary ions;
• focusing a beam of said parent ions along a flight path onto an ion reflectron that comprises one or more reflectron lenses and a non-movable surface with an adjustable potential,
• sufficiently increasing said non-movable surface potential so that said parent ions are reflected without striking said movable surface;
• focusing said deflected parent ions into a detector for separation;
• lowering said non-movable surface potential so that said parent ions strike said non-movable surface, so that collision of said parent ions with said non-movable surface dissociates said parent ions into ion fragments;
• and
• focusing said ion fragments into said detector for separation.