Thomas Letzel | Authors

The optimization of adjustable factors in electrospray ionization (ESI) by design of experiments (DoE) is presented. This approach allows a comprehensive and systematic optimization of all relevant factors for the ionization of compounds and increases the understanding about factor influences on the ionization efficiency.

In plant metabolomics, molecular fingerprints and additional molecular descriptors can be identified using recent developments in polarity-extended separations with serial coupling of reversed-phase LC and HILIC combined with ESI-TOF-MS.

The combination of reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC), atmospheric pressure ionization (API), mass spectrometry (MS) and tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) is ideal for determining and characterizing analytes in complex biological matrices. This review looks at the importance of parameters such as hydrophobicity, ionization properties, molecular mass and, partially, the molecular structure resulting from applied LC–MS–MS systems in analytical laboratories. The use of these parameters to investigate biomolecules and their unambiguous identification is also described.