Atmospheric-pressure, drift-tube ion mobility spectrometry (IMS) with high-speed TOFMS detection. Fast, decisive 2-dimensional separations with IMS resolving power up to 200.

The high resolution of the IMS-TOF enables confident analysis of isomers, protein conformers, and lipids
Overview
Specifications
Publications
Resources
Overview
Advantages of the IMS-TOF
- Separate isomers with IMS resolving power of up to 200
- Measure accurate and reproducible collision cross sections (CCS) without calibration
- Resolve and identify protein and peptide conformers
- Analyze unknowns based on CCS, accurate mass, and CID
- Improve sensitivity 200x compared to conventional DTIMS using artifact-free multiplexing
Specifications
The IMS-TOF utilizes a drift-tube ion mobility spectrometer (DTIMS) coupled with a high-speed TOF mass spectrometer.

IMS Resolving Power | Up to 200 |
---|---|
IMS Pressure | 800 – 1400 mbar ± 1 mbar |
IMS Temperature | ambient – 150°C ± 1°C |
Mass Resolving Power | up to 10000 |
Relative Mass Accuracy | 2 ppm (internal calibration) |
Sensitivity | 150 counts/fmol reserpine |
Dimensions | 120 x 60 x 90 cm (bench-top) |
Drift Tube IMS Cell
- Use any drift gas in the the pressure and temperature-controlled IMS cell.
- DTIMS is uniquely capable of direct CCS determination
- Precisely controlled drift-tube pressure and temperature ensures reproducible CCS measurements
Design
- Compact, robust design for laboratory and field applications
- Simple LC coupling with our flexible hardware, software and data format
- Separation under high-pressure, low-field conditions preserves native structure of protein and supramolecular assemblies
- IMS resolving power of 200 enables separation of isomers with CCS differences as low as 0.5%
- Post-IMS CID for precursor and fragment correlation
- Multiplexed IMS boosts the duty cycle from <1% to 50%, eliminating the conventional trade-offs between sensitivity, mobility range, and resolving power
- Gas-tight ESI source reduces background signals and harmonizes with drift tube pressure
Software
- Easy-to-use software for data acquisition and post-processing, based on our open-source, multi-dimensional file format (HDF5)
- Proprietary data processing yields real gains in signal/noise and IMS resolution
Publications
IMS-TOF Publications
2017
- Gloess, A., et al., On-line analysis of coffee roasting with ion mobility spectrometry-mass spectrometry (IMS-MS), International Journal of Mass Spectrometry, 2017. Â DOI:10.1016/j.ijms.2017.11.017
- Grössl, M. & Kornél Nagy, Benefits of ion mobility for analysing monochloropropane-diol esters, Food Additives & Contaminants: Part A, 2017. DOI:10.1080/19440049.2017.1325014
- Kiesilä, A., et al., Simultaneous endo and exo Complex Formation of Pyridine[4]arene Dimers with Neutral and Anionic Guests, Angewandte Chemie, 2017. DOI: 10.1002/anie.201704054
- Zhang, X., et al., Highly Oxygenated Multifunctional Compounds in α-Pinene Secondary Organic Aerosol, Environ. Science and Technology, 2017. DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.6b06588
- Sullivan, M., et al., The metalation of hen egg white lysozyme impacts protein stability as shown by ion mobility mass spectrometry, differential scanning calorimetry, and X-ray crystallography, Chemical Comm., 2017. DOI: 10.1039/c6cc10150j
2016
- Lemmnitzer, K., et al., Comparison of ion mobility-mass spectrometry and pulsed-field gradient nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy for the differentiation of chondroitin sulfate isomers, Analytical Methods, 2016. DOI: 10.1039/c6ay02531e
- Zhang, X., et al., A novel framework for molecular characterization of atmospherically relevant organic compounds based on collision cross section and mass-to-charge ratio, AMT, 2016. DOI:10.5194/acp-16-12945-2016
- Krechmer, J., et al., Ion mobility spectrometry–mass spectrometry (IMS–MS) for on- and offline analysis of atmospheric gas and aerosol species, AMT, 2016. In Focus | :10.5194/amt-9-3245-2016
- Liu, W., et al., Multidimensional Separation of Natural Products Using Liquid Chromatography Coupled to Hadamard Transform Ion Mobility Mass Spectrometry, J. Am. Soc. Mass Spec., 2016 DOI: 10.1007/s13361-016-1346-8
2015
- Jurcek, O., et al., Superchiral Pd3L6 Coordination Complex and Its Reversible Structural Conversion into Pd3L3Cl6 Metallocycles, Angewandte Chemie, 2015 In Focus | DOI: 10.1002/anie.201506539
- Groessl, M., et al., High resolution ion mobility-mass spectrometry for separation and identification of isomeric lipids, Analyst, 2015, In Focus | DOI: 10.1039/C5AN00838G
- Bonakdarzadeh, P., et al., DOSY NMR, X‑ray Structural and Ion-Mobility Mass Spectrometric Studies on Electron-Deficient and Electron-Rich M6L4 Coordination Cages, Inorg. Chem. 2015, In Focus  | DOI:10.1021/acs.inorgchem.5b01082
- Groessl, M., Analysis of Isomeric Lipids by High Resolution Ion Mobility Mass Spectrometry,  63rd ASMS Conference, St. Louis, USA, 2015 In Focus | Poster
2014
- Zhang, X., Evaluation of Hadamard Transform Atmospheric Pressure Ion Mobility Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry for Complex Mixture Analysis” Anal. Chem., 2014. DOI: 10.1021/ac403435p
- Groessl, M., et al., Comparison of UHPLC-ESI-MS and Hadamard Transform Atmospheric Pressure Ion Mobility-ESI-MS for Profiling of Isomeric Flavonoids, Chimia, 2014. DOI:10.2533/chimia.2014.1
2013
- Knochenmuss, R., et al., Multiplexed High Pressure Ion Mobility-TOFMS: High Resolution, Sensitivity and Structural Information in One Package, 61nd ASMS Conference on Mass Spectrometry and Allied Topics, 2013. Extended Abstract
2012
- Harris, G., et al., Coupling laser ablation/desorption electrospray ionization to atmospheric pressure drift tube ion mobility spectrometry for the screening of antimalarial drug quality, Analyst, 2012. DOI: 10.1039/c2an35431d
2011
- Crawford, Christina, et al., The novel use of gas chromatography-ion mobility-time of flight mass spectrometry with secondary electrospray ionization for complex mixture analysis, Int. J. Ion Mobility Spect. 2011. DOI: 10.1007/s12127-010-0057-2
2010
- Kaplan, K., et al., Resistive Glass IM-TOFMS, Anal. Chem., 2010. DOI: 10.1021/ac1017259
- Kwasnik, M. and F. Fernández, Theoretical and experimental study of the achievable separation power in resistive-glass atmospheric pressure ion mobility spectrometry, Rapid Comm. Mass Spec, 2010. DOI: 10.1002/rcm.4592
2008
- Mukhopadhyay, R., IMS/MS: Its time has come, Anal. Chem., 2008. DOI: 10.1021/ac8018608
2007
- Kwasnik, M., et al., Performance, resolving power, and radial ion distributions of a prototype nanoelectrospray ionization resistive glass atmospheric pressure ion mobility spectrometer, A. Chem., 2007. DOI: 10.1021/ac071226o
Resources
Related Applications
Read more about the capabilities and benefits of our high resolution drift-tube IMS for the analysis of protein and peptide conformers, as well as isomers in natural products, lipidomics and metabolomics.