March 9, 2015 (Pittcon, New Orleans) -- JEOL is proud to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the introduction of the enormously popular AccuTOF-DART® ambient ionization mass spectrometer by introducing the new AccuTOF-DART®4G at Pittcon 2015, with new performance capabilities including enhanced resolution, speed, and accuracy in a rugged, flexible, versatile design. The AccuTOF-DART 4G couples the facile operation of the DART (Direct Analysis in Real Time) ion source with the high-resolution, accurate mass capability of the AccuTOF time-of-flight mass spectrometer. Not only can the user rapidly acquire data for mixtures and complete unknowns without sample carryover, but the resulting spectra yield unambiguous assignments, isotopic ratios and elemental compositions.
JEOL led the way with the first commercially available ambient ionization mass spectrometer, and continues with a leading role in the field. The DART® ion source won the Pittcon 2005 Editors' Gold Award for Best New Product when it was introduced that year. It's co-inventor, Dr. Robert (Chip) Cody of JEOL recently co-authored a textbook with Marek Domin of the Merket Chemistry Center, Boston College, examining the growth and impact of this revolutionary mass spectrometry technique. The ability to place almost anything in front of an ion source for instantaneous analysis has been "truly liberating," the editors say. The new book, Ambient Ionization Mass Spectrometry, is now available from the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Of the development of the DART, Dr. Cody recalls, "We now had a way to measure mass spectra in real time for liquids, solids, and gases sampled directly. After decades of dissolving and injecting samples into GC/MS and LC/MS systems or introducing materials into vacuum chambers, this was truly liberating! Now we could analyze almost anything instantaneously. We could not analyze everything directly, but the probability of getting useful information was high, and the amount of effort required to attempt the analysis was minimal. We began examining everything we could find, from foods and beverages to clothing and rubber tires, drugs and explosives."
Ambient ionization is a rapidly growing topic within mass spectrometry. To that end, Dr. Cody says, " We have attempted to offer a wide variety of innovative approaches to instrumentation and chemical analysis presented by the leaders in the field."
As the use of the AccuTOF-DART mass spectrometry technique has continued to expand among various fields of research and analysis, JEOL has documented over 200 published papers and has published its own series of applications notes available at www.jeolusa.com.