Ion detector of time-of-flight mass spectrometer with registration of leading and trailing edges

V V Filatov; S V Filatov; A R Pikhtelev; H Zhu; I V Sulimenkov; Z Huang; V S Brusov; V I Kozlovskiy

doi:10.1063/5.0160716

Ion detector of time-of-flight mass spectrometer with registration of leading and trailing edges

Rev Sci Instrum. 2023 Oct 1;94(10):103303. doi: 10.1063/5.0160716.

Authors

V V Filatov¹, S V Filatov^{1

2}, A R Pikhtelev¹, H Zhu³, I V Sulimenkov¹, Z Huang⁴, V S Brusov¹, V I Kozlovskiy¹

Affiliations

¹ Chernogolovka Branch of the N.N. Semenov Federal Research Center for Chemical Physics, Russian Academy of Sciences, Prospect Ac. Semenov 1/10, Chernogolovka, Moscow Region 142432, Russia.
² Osipyan Institute of Solid State Physics Russian Academy of Sciences, Chernogolovka, 2 Academician Osipyan Str., Moscow Region 142432, Russia.
³ Kunshan Hexin Mass Spectrometry Technology Co., Ltd., Kunshan 215311, China.
⁴ Institute of Mass Spectrometry and Atmospheric Environment, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China.

PMID: 37791856
DOI: 10.1063/5.0160716

Abstract

The accuracy of the ion flight time measurement in the time-of-flight mass spectrometer is critical to achieving high resolution. The pulse amplitude variation of the detector pulses leads to the registration time spread at a given pulse detection threshold. This time spread can be eliminated by determining the position of the pulse apex. To determine the position of the pulse apex, the output of the ion detector is fed simultaneously to the two channels of the time-to-digital converter. In this case, the first channel is set to register the leading edge, and the second channel is set to register the trailing edge of the pulse. Using a simple processing of the received data, the position of the pulse tip is determined. Thus, the dependence of the temporal position of the peak on the pulse amplitude is largely eliminated. Examples are given, and the efficiency of using this algorithm to increase the resolution of time-of-flight mass spectral peak registration is demonstrated.