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US 6,888,130 B1Granted
Electrostatic ion trap mass spectrometers
OwnerMarc Gonininventor
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An improved electrostatic ion trap mass spectrometer based on two reflectrons and Fourier Transform analysis is disclosed. An ensemble of ions with a kinetic energy falling into a certain range will do isochronous oscillations in this reflectron trap. The image charge transient of those oscillations is processed with a data acquisition system similar to those used in FT-MS to get a mass spectrum. Various application-specific ion extractors, ion storage prior to extraction, MS/MS techniques and MSn techniques are also disclosed.
Claims46
An electrostatic ion trap apparatus for mass analysis or mass separation of a population of ions comprising:
- means to generate ions or means to introduce existing ions into said apparatus;
- two opposing ion reflectors and a drift region that provide an electric field in which said ions make isochronous oscillations;
- a voltage supply for feeding the ion reflectors with constant DC voltages;
- sensing means for sensing a transient of said oscillations;
- a data acquisition system capable of producing a mass spectrum by transforming said oscillation transient;
- and
- an ion injection mechanism to inject said ions into said trap, wherein said ion injection mechanism comprises a pulsed ion injector device that injects said ions into said trap with a pulsed electric field in such a way that said ions are time-focused in a center region of said trap generally corresponding to a position of said sensing means.
4 more elements
An electrostatic ion trap apparatus for mass analysis or mass separation of a population of ions comprising:
- means to generate ions or means to introduce existing ions into said apparatus;
- two opposing ion reflectors and a drift region that provide an electric field in which said ions make isochronous oscillations, whereby said ion reflectors each comprise a plurality of electrodes;
- a voltage supply for feeding the ion reflectors with constant DC voltages;
- means for sensing a transient of said oscillations;
- a data acquisition system capable of producing a mass spectrum by transforming said oscillation transient;
- an ion injection mechanism to inject said ions into said trap;
- and
- a device for isolating one or several species of ions in said trap by changing the potential of one or several of said electrodes of said ion reflectors at least once for a certain time span causing chances in the trajectory of one or several species of ions that are flying close to the one or several of said electrodes, wherein said changes lead to an orbit of selected ions in such a way that said selected ions exit the trap or hit an electrode of said trap and get lost or wherein said changes lead to an orbit of selected ions in such a way that said selected ions are injected into a second ion trap for further processing.
5 more elements
An electrostatic ion trap apparatus for mass analysis or mass separation of a population of ions comprising:
- means to generate ions or means to introduce existing ions into said apparatus;
- two opposing ion reflectors and a drift region that provide an electric field in which said ions make isochronous oscillations, whereby said ion reflectors are constituted by a plurality of electrostatic elements whereby said elements of each of said reflectors are high-frequency coupled;
- a voltage supply for feeding said ion reflectors with constant DC voltages;
- a first pick-up electrode and a second pick-up electrode, whereby a differential voltage between said first and second pick-up electrodes is sensed in order to obtain a transient of said oscillations;
- a data acquisition system capable of producing a mass spectrum by transforming said oscillation transient;
- and
- an ion injection mechanism to inject said ions into said trap, whereby said first pick-up electrode and said second pick-up electrode are caps, said first pick-up electrode coupled to a first of said ion reflectors and said second pick-up electrode coupled to another of said ion reflectors.
4 more elements
An electrostatic ion trap apparatus for mass analysis or mass separation of a population of ions comprising:
- means to generate ions or means to introduce existing ions into said apparatus;
- two opposing ion reflectors and a drift region that provide an electric field in which said ions make isochronous oscillations;
- means for sensing a transient of said oscillations;
- a data acquisition system capable of producing a mass spectrum by transforming said oscillation transient;
- an ion injection mechanism to inject said ions into said trap;
- and
- means for fragmenting said injected ions inside said trap and wherein said fragmentation means comprises an electron generator for generating low energetic electrons and a grid arranged in a back plate of one of said ion reflectors, whereby said electron generator is arranged such that said low energetic electrons enter said ion reflector through said grid.
4 more elements
An electrostatic ion trap apparatus for mass analysis or mass separation of a population of ions comprising:
- means to generate ions or means to introduce existing ions into said apparatus;
- two opposing ion reflectors and a drift region that provide an electric field in which said ions make isochronous oscillations;
- a voltage supply for feeding the ion reflectors with constant DC voltages;
- means for sensing a transient of said oscillations;
- a data acquisition system capable of producing a mass spectrum by transforming said oscillation transient;
- an ion injection mechanism to inject said ions into said trap;
- and
- a fragmentation device to fragment said pre-selected ions into fragment ions, in order to perform a tandem MS/MS analysis in a single ion trap, wherein said fragmentation occurs in a turning point of said oscillations in either of said reflectors, wherein said fragmentation is caused by surface induced fragmentation (SID) or beam induced fragmentation.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.