Laser ablation/ionizaton and mass spectrometric analysis of massive polymers

Claim 1

A method of analyzing an organic sample containing one or more compounds of high molecular weight comprising: selecting an organic sample containing one or more high molecular weight compounds; dissolving said sample in a solvent to form a solution; dissolving in said solution a soluble compound containing atoms of one or more metals having a low ionization potential; cooling a sample state and depositing said solution on a surface of said sample stage to form a frozen thin film of said solution on said sample stage; placing said film-coated sample stage in a chamber and evacuating said chamber to high vacuum while maintaining said film in a frozen state; exposing said film to a laser pulse at a wavelength absorbed efficiently by the sample stage, said laser pulse rapidly heating the surface of said sample stage to ablate said film and create a plume of solvent vapor containing intact molecules of the organic sample and metal atoms; tuning said laser pulse to wavelengths coincident with resonant electronic transitions in said metal atoms in said vapor plume to create ions of said metal atoms by multiphoton ionization during the laser pulse, said ions of the metal atoms attaching to said molecules of the organic sample to form molecular ions; and accelerating said molecular ions into a mass spectrometer to determine the masses of said molecular ions, and identify the molecular components of said organic sample.

Claim 2

A method of analyzing an organic sample containing one or more compounds of high molecular weight comprising: selecting an organic sample containing one or more high molecular weight compounds; dissolving said sample in a solvent to form a solution; dissolving in said solution a soluble compound containing atoms of one or more metals having a low ionization potential; cooling a sample state and depositing said solution on a surface of said sample stage to form a frozen thin film of said solution on said sample stage; placing said film-coated sample stage in a chamber and evacuating said chamber to high vacuum while maintaining said film in a frozen state; exposing said film to a laser pulse at a wavelength absorbed efficiently by the sample stage, said laser pulse rapidly heating the surface of said sample stage to ablate said film and create a plume of solvent vapor containing intact molecules of the organic sample and metal atoms; tuning said laser pulse to wavelengths coincident with resonant electronic transitions in said metal atoms in said vapor plume to create ions of said metal atoms by multiphoton ionization during the laser pulse, said ions of the metal atoms attaching to said molecules of the organic sample to form molecular ions; and accelerating said molecular ions into a mass spectrometer to determine the masses of said molecular ions, and identify the molecular components of said organic sample.