TY - JOUR A1 - Ickert, Stefanie A1 - Beck, S. A1 - Linscheid, M. A1 - Riedel, Jens T1 - VUV Photodissociation Induced by a Deuterium Lamp in an Ion Trap JF - Journal of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry N2 - Tandem mass spectrometry represents an important analytical tool to unravel molecular structures and to study the gas-phase behavior of organic molecules. Besides commonly used methods like collision-induced dissociation and electron capture or transfer dissociation, new ultraviolet light–based techniques have the potential to synergistically add to the activation methods. Here, we present a new simple, yet robust, experimental design for polychromatic activation of trapped ions using the 115–160 nm output of a commercially available deuterium lamp. The resulting continuous dissociative excitation with photons of a wide energy range from 7.7 to 10.8 eV is studied for a comprehensive set of analyte classes in both positive and negative ion modes. While being simple, affordable, compact, and of low maintenance, the new setup initiates fragmentation of most precursor ions via their known dissociation pathways. Additionally, some new fragmentation patterns were discovered. Especially, electron loss and electron capture reactions with subsequent fragmentations were observed. For oligonucleotides, peptides, carbohydrates, and organic dyes, in comparison to collision-induced dissociation, a significantly wider fragment distribution was obtained, resulting in an information increase. Since the individual photons carry enough energy to post-ionize the nascent fragments, a permanent vacuum ultraviolet light exposure inside the ion trap potentially goes along with a general increase in detection capability. KW - Fragmentation activation KW - Vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) light KW - Mass spectrometry KW - Tandem MS PY - 2019 DO - https://doi.org/10.1007/s13361-019-02282-8 SN - 1044-0305 VL - 30 IS - 10 SP - 2114 EP - 2122 PB - Springer Nature CY - Heidelberg AN - OPUS4-48756 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ickert, Stefanie A1 - Riedel, Jens A1 - Beck, S. A1 - Linscheid, M. W. T1 - Negative nucleotide ions as sensitive probes for energy specificity in collision‐induced fragmentation in mass spectrometry JF - Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry N2 - Rationale: The most commonly used fragmentation methods in tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) are collision‐induced dissociation (CID) and higher energy collisional dissociation (HCD). While in CID the preselected ions in the trap are resonantly (and m/z exclusively) excited, in HCD the entire m/z range experiences the dissociative acceleration. The different excitation is reflected in different fragment distributions. Methods: As a test‐bed for particularly pronounced fragmentation specificity, here MS/MS experiments on several 4‐mer oligonucleotides were conducted employing both collision methods and the results were thoroughly compared. Oligonucleotides are shown to be sensitive probes to subtle changes, especially in the negative ion mode. A detailed analysis of these differences reveals insight into the dissociation mechanics. Results: Thedifferencesarerepresentedinheat‐maps,whichallowforadirectvisualinspection oflargeamountsofdata.Inthesefalsecolourrepresentationsthe,sometimessubtle,changesinthe individual dissociation product distributions become distinct. Another advantage of these graphic plots can be found in the formation of systematic patterns. These patterns reflect trends in dissociation specificity which allow for the formulation of general rules in fragmentation behavior. Conclusions: Instruments equipped with two different excitation schemes for MS/MS are today widely available. Nonetheless, direct comparisons between the individual results are scarcely made. Such comparative studies bear a powerful analytical potential to elucidate fragmentation reaction mechanism. KW - DNA KW - Tandem MS KW - HCD KW - CID PY - 2018 DO - https://doi.org/10.1002/rcm.8062 SN - 0951-4198 SN - 1097-0231 VL - 32 IS - 7 SP - 597 EP - 603 PB - Wiley & Sons, Ltd. AN - OPUS4-44430 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -