Temperature effects in differential mobility spectrometry

Drift gas temperature and pressure influence differential mobility spectrometer (DMS) performance, changing DMS peak positions, heights and widths. This study characterizes the effect of temperature on DMS peak positions. Positive ions of methyl salicylate, DMMP, and toluene, and negative ions of methyl salicylate and the reactant ion peaks were observed in purified nitrogen in the Sionex microDMx planar DMS. Measurements were made at ambient pressure (1 atm) at temperatures from 25 °C to 150 °C in a planar sensor with height 0.5 mm. Peak value of the separation voltage asymmetric waveform was scanned from 500 V to 1500 V. Compensation voltage (DMS peak position) showed a strong variation with temperature for all investigated ions. By generalizing the concept of effective ion temperature to include the effects of inelastic ion–molecular collisions, we have been able to condense peak position dependence on separation field and temperature to dependence on a redefined effective temperature including a smoothly varying inelasticity correction. It allows prediction and correction of the gas temperature effect on DMS peak positions.