Reliable Detection of Chemical Warfare Agents Using High Kinetic Energy Ion Mobility Spectrometry

• Published in: Journal of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry 2024-08, Vol.35 (8), p.2008-2019
• Main Authors: Schaefer, Christoph, Allers, Maria, Hitzemann, Moritz, Nitschke, Alexander, Kobelt, Tim, Mörtel, Max, Schröder, Stefanie, Ficks, Arne, Zimmermann, Stefan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 1044-0305; 1879-1123; 1879-1123
• DOI: 10.1021/jasms.4c00240

High Kinetic Energy Ion Mobility Spectrometers (HiKE-IMS) ionize and separate ions at reduced pressures of 10–40 mbar and over a wide range of reduced electric field strengths E/N of up to 120 Td. Their reduced operating pressure is distinct from that of conventional drift tube ion mobility spectrometers that operate at ambient pressure for trace compound detection. High E/N can lead to a field-induced fragmentation pattern that provides more specific structural information about the analytes. In addition, operation at high E/N values adds the field dependence of ion mobility as an additional separation dimension to low-field ion mobility, making interfering compounds less likely to cause a false positive alarm. In this work, we study the chemical warfare agents tabun (GA), sarin (GB), soman (GD), cyclosarin (GF) and sulfur mustard (HD) in a HiKE-IMS at variable E/N in both the reaction and the drift region. The results show that varying E/N can lead to specific fragmentation patterns at high E/N values combined with molecular signals at low E/N. Compared to the operation at a single E/N value in the drift region, the variation of E/N in the drift region also provides the analyte-specific field dependence of ion mobility as additional information. The accumulated data establish a unique fingerprint for each analyte that allows for reliable detection of chemical warfare agents even in the presence of interfering compounds with similar low-field ion mobilities, thus reducing false positives.