Recent experimental efforts have shown that single particle levitation methods may be effectively coupled with mass spectrometry (MS) using paper spray (PS) ionization for compositional analysis of picoliter droplets. In this work, we characterize the response of PS-MS to analytes delivered in the form of picoliter droplets and explore its potential for identification and quantification of these samples. Using a microdroplet dispenser to generate droplets, we demonstrate sensitivity to a range of oxygenated organic molecules typical of compounds found in atmospheric secondary organic aerosol. We assess experimental factors that influence the reproducibility and sensitivity of the method and explore the linearity of the system response to increasing analyte mass in droplets containing single or multicomponent analytes. We show that the ratio of analyte signal from multicomponent samples may be used to characterize the relative composition of the system. These measurements demonstrate that the droplet PS-MS method is an effective tool for qualitative and quantitative analysis of single picoliter droplets containing picogram levels of analyte. The potential applications of this technique for characterizing the composition of levitated particles will be discussed.

中文翻译：

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纸喷雾质谱法用于分析微微升液滴。

最近的实验成果表明，单颗粒悬浮方法可以有效地结合使用纸喷雾（PS）电离进行皮升液滴组成分析的质谱（MS）。在这项工作中，我们表征了PS-MS对以皮升液滴形式递送的分析物的响应，并探索了其在鉴定和定量这些样品中的潜力。使用微滴分配器产生液滴，我们证明了对大气中次级有机气溶胶中典型化合物的一系列氧化有机分子的敏感性。我们评估影响该方法可重复性和灵敏度的实验因素，并探索系统对包含单或多组分分析物的液滴中分析物质量增加的响应的线性。我们表明，多组分样品中分析物信号的比率可用于表征系统的相对组成。这些测量结果表明，液滴PS-MS方法是定性和定量分析包含皮克级分析物的单个皮升液滴的有效工具。将讨论该技术在表征悬浮颗粒组成方面的潜在应用。