Mejoras en instrumentación de análisis químico de muestras en fase gaseosa en tiempo real (improvements on real-time, gas-phase, analytical chemistry instrumentation)

Resumen

In this PhD Thesis, improvements on the elements of a mass spectrometrybased, real-time vapor analyzer were developed. This system is composed of several concatenated stages. Two of them are the focus of this work: the ionizer and the mobility separation. The main objective of this work was to optimize two existing technologies but only as prototypes. The workhorse of this work was numerical simulation. The algorithms were specially formulated and validated. The ionization technique referred in this PhD Thesis is widely known at academic level as SESI (Secondary Electrospray Ionization). However, it has not been implemented in industry. The results of this work served to design a commercial unit that quintuplicates the standard SESI-MS sensitivity. The ion mobility technology referred in this PhD is known as TMIMS (Transversal Modulation Ion Mobility Spectrometry), which at the beginning of this research was a proof-of-concept. The results of this work served to optimize an earlier TMIMS geometry and explain some particularities of the physics involved. Finally, a practical application is shown (the analysis of volatile organic compounds released by a plant), using the SESI ionizer coupled to a High Resolution Mass Spectrometer. There were two goals in this study. The first one was to test the system on a relevant environment, showing the capabilities of SESI-MS on the study of biological systems. Second, this study includes data processing and interpretation (such as relating the detected volatiles with the biological activity), the last step on vapor analysis. The results shown in this PhD Thesis suggest that a SESI-TMIMS-MS system would be an interesting vapor analysis tool with performance competing with the stateof-the-art dominant technique: GC-MS (Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry).