Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword by D. M. Engelman
- Foreword by Pierre Joliot
- Preface
- Introduction: Molecular biophysics at the beginning of the twenty-first century: from ensemble measurements to single-molecule detection
- Part A Biological macromolecules and physical tools
- Part B Mass spectrometry
- Chapter B1 Mass and charge
- Chapter B2 Structure function studies
- Part C Thermodynamics
- Part D Hydrodynamics
- Part E Optical spectroscopy
- Part F Optical microscopy
- Part G X-ray and neutron diffraction
- Part H Electron diffraction
- Part I Molecular dynamics
- Part J Nuclear magnetic resonance
- References
- Index of eminent scientists
- Subject Index
- References
Chapter B1 - Mass and charge
from Part B - Mass spectrometry
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 November 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword by D. M. Engelman
- Foreword by Pierre Joliot
- Preface
- Introduction: Molecular biophysics at the beginning of the twenty-first century: from ensemble measurements to single-molecule detection
- Part A Biological macromolecules and physical tools
- Part B Mass spectrometry
- Chapter B1 Mass and charge
- Chapter B2 Structure function studies
- Part C Thermodynamics
- Part D Hydrodynamics
- Part E Optical spectroscopy
- Part F Optical microscopy
- Part G X-ray and neutron diffraction
- Part H Electron diffraction
- Part I Molecular dynamics
- Part J Nuclear magnetic resonance
- References
- Index of eminent scientists
- Subject Index
- References
Summary
Historical review
1897
J. J. Thomson made the first measurement of the mass-to-charge ratio of elementary particle ‘corpuscles’, which later became known as electrons. This can fairly be considered as the birth of mass spectrometry.
1918–1919
A. Dempster and F. Aston developed the first mass spectrographs. Photographic plate was used as the array detector. The instruments were used for isotopic relative abundance measurements.
1951
W. Pauli and H. Steinwedel described the development of a quadrupole mass spectrometer. The application of superimposed radio-frequency and constant potentials between four parallel rods acted as a mass separator in which only ions within a particular mass range perform oscillations of constant amplitude and are collected at the far end of the analyser.
1959
K. Biemann was the first to apply electron ionisation mass spectrometry to the analysis of peptides. Later it was shown that for sequence determination, peptides had to be derivatized prior to analysis by a direct probe.
1968–1970
M. Dole was the first to bring synthetic and natural polymers into the gas phase at atmospheric pressure. This was done by spraying a sample solution from a small tube into a strong electric field in the presence of a flow of warm nitrogen, to assist desolvation. First experiments on lysozyme demonstrated the phenomenon of multiple charging.
1974
D. Torgerson introduced plasma desorption mass spectrometry. This technique uses 252Cf fission fragments to desorb large molecules from a target.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Methods in Molecular BiophysicsStructure, Dynamics, Function, pp. 111 - 135Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2007