Evaluation of ion mobility-mass spectrometry for determining the isomeric heterogeneity of oligosaccharide-alditols derived from bovine submaxillary mucin

- Ion mobility-mass spectrometry (IMMS) has the capability to rapidly evaluate the isomeric heterogeneity of oligosaccharide mixtures on millisecond timescale.
- Even after a single HPLC column, isomeric structures that were present in fractions could frequently be resolved as independent peaks using IMMS.
- Ion mobility coupled to tandem stages of mass spectrometry enabled different sets of product ions to be assigned to different isomeric precursors within a given m/z pool.