ABSTRACT
The simultaneous nature of sampling ions in TOF offers distinct advantages over traditional scanning (sequential) quadrupole technology for ICP-MS applications where large amounts of data need to be captured in a short amount of time. To understand the benefits of this mass separation device, let us first take a look at its fundamental principles. All time-of-flight mass spectrometers are based on the same principle that the kinetic energy (KE) of an ion is directly proportional to its mass (m) and velocity (V). This can be represented by the equation:
Therefore if a population of ions-all with different masses-is given the same KE by an accelerating voltage (U), the velocities of the ions will all be different, based on their masses. This principle is then used to separate ions
FIGURE 9.1 Principles of ion detection using time-of-flight technology, showing separation of three different masses in the time domain.
