Gas chromatography/multiphoton ionization/time-of-flight mass spectrometry using a femtosecond laser.

A laser can be used for the selective excitation and subsequent ionization of a molecule with an absorption band at the laser wavelength. This technique of multiphoton ionization (MPI), when combined with time-of-flight mass spectrometry (TOF-MS), permits the efficient detection of induced ions in mass analysis. This combination of MPI/TOF-MS can be coupled with gas chromatography (GC) to achieve even more enhanced selectivity. Thus, GC/MPI/TOF-MS can be employed for trace analysis of samples containing numerous chemical species. A variety of laser sources have been used for this purpose. Since molecules that are classified as environmental pollutants frequently contain chlorine and bromine atoms, the lifetime of the excited state can be decreased by energy transfer from the singlet to triplet levels by spin-orbit interaction. A high-power femtosecond laser with a pulse width shorter than the lifetime of the analyte molecule provides femtogram or even subfemtogram detection limits, which have not yet been achieved using the most sensitive high-resolution double-focus sector-type mass spectrometers. Numerous environmental pollutants such as dioxins in soils and pesticides in foods have been successfully quantified using GC/MPI/TOF-MS, and this technique has proven itself to be a useful and practical method for trace analysis.