ABSTRACT
Mass spectrometry (MS) is based on the production of ions, that are subsequently separated or filtered according to their mass-to-charge (m/z) ratio and detected. The resulting mass spectrum is a plot of the (relative) abundance of the generated ions as a function of the m/z. Excellent selectivity can be obtained, which is of utmost importance in quantitative trace analysis. This chapter is not a brief introduction in MS, but rather highlights important aspects for the discussions on liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC–MS) to come. General discussion and tutorials in MS can be found elsewhere [1-2].
