A High-Repetition-Rate IR Laser for Mass Spectrometry

描述（由申请人提供）：第一阶段SBIR研究项目的目标是为高通量和高灵敏度IR MALDI应用开发高重复率可调红外激光系统。传统的MALDI使用低重复率的激光系统，当必须分析大量样品时，或者在尖端的扫描/绘图应用中，如印迹、直接凝胶或组织分析，可能会产生较长的测量时间。减少分析时间对于包括功能蛋白质组学和药物发现在内的几个领域的商业大容量实验室非常重要。最近的研究集中在利用高重复率（1khz）紫外激光系统来提高UV- maldi和AP-MALDI实验的吞吐量和灵敏度。然而，由于缺乏合适的激光系统，在高代表率IR MALDI领域还没有研究，它比UV MALDI有几个优点，包括分析大质量DNA和其他高分子量生物分子，分析凝胶印迹或直接来自细胞或组织样品的生物聚合物，以及分析药物和其他低分子量分子（200 - 1500 Da）。一种可调谐的高重复率OPO激光系统将被开发和构建，并将评估其用于各种分析物的MALDI性能。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The goal of this Phase I SBIR research program is to develop a high-repetition-rate tunable IR laser system for high-throughput and high-sensitivity IR MALDI applications. Traditional MALDI had utilized low-repetition-rate laser systems, which can yield lengthy measurement times when large numbers of samples must be analyzed, or in cutting-edge scanning/mapping applications such as blot, direct gel or tissue analysis. Reducing analysis times is important for commercial high-volume laboratories in several areas including functional proteomics and drug discovery. Recent research has focused on utilizing high-repetition-rate (1 kHz) UV laser systems for both improved throughput and increased sensitivity in UV-MALDI and AP-MALDI experiments. However due to lack of suitable laser systems, there has been no research in the area of high-rep-rate IR MALDI, which has several advantages over UV MALDI including analysis of high-mass DNA and other high molecular weight biomolecules, analysis of biopolymers from gel blots or directly from cell or tissue samples, and the analysis of pharmaceuticals and other low molecular weight molecules (200 - 1500 Da). A tunable high-repetition-rate OPO laser system will be developed and built, and its MALDI performance for a variety of analytes will be assessed.