Current calibration techniques of mass spectrometry instruments utilize macromolecules, dendrimers, and well-defined peptides. Polyester-based dendrimers are ideal for calibrants due to their ease of synthesis, wide mass range and high purity. These calibrants consist predominately of H, C, O, N, and S, which all exhibit a positive mass defect. The use of these as internal calibrants can, therefore, be complicated when the calibration signal and analyte signal could be confused, which is of particular concern when analyzing unknown biomolecules. Internal calibrants can only be employed if sufficient mass difference exists between the calibrant and analyte. This process becomes particularly taxing for polydisperse synthetic polymers which exhibit diverse molecular weight ranges rather than a specific mass. The use of iodine-containing dendritic calibrants results in a negative mass defect which allows for their use as internal calibrants by eliminating the likelihood of confusion of the calibrant and analyte signals.

Iodine-containing mass defect tuned bis-MPA dendrimers as internal calibrants for mass spectrometry

245th National Meeting (2013)

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