Grant Information for UC Investigators

Any UC-affliated investigators wishing to include information about the mass spectrometry facility services and/or costs are welcome to utilize the following information in their grant applications. This information should be used "as-is" and no modifications are permitted without prior permission of the Faculty Supervisor, Dr. Pat Limbach (pat.limbach@uc.edu). In addition, for planning purposes we ask that you inform the facility of any grant submissions that include use of the services. Any investigator proposing extensive use of mass spectrometry services (e.g., proteomics) should contact Dr. Pat Limbach (pat.limbach@uc.edu) prior to preparing a budget request.

Facility Information

At the present time, our facility is equipped with the following instrumentation:

Micromass Q-TOF-2™
The Q-TOF-2™ is a hybrid quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometer. The instrument is equipped with various electrospray and ionspray ionization sources. This instrument is primarily utilized for accurate mass measurements of low molecular weight organic compounds, electrospray analysis of soluble biological compounds, and for on-line LC-MS analysis.

ThermoFinnigan LTQ Linear Ion-Trap FTMS
The Finnigan LTQ-FT™ combines the most advanced Ion Trap and Fourier Transform Ion Cyclotron Resonance technologies into a single instrument with unprecedented analytical power and versatility. While the FT-ICR is providing high mass accuracy and high resolution mass spectra, the linear ion trap can simultaneously provide multiple collision-induced dissociations for structural identification. Extremely sensitive while possessing a mass accuracy of less than 1 ppm, mass resolution exceeding 100K, and MSn capabilities, this instrument can readily identify proteins from 1D gel bands, 2D gel spots or HPLC separated proteins in low femtomole amounts using nanospray.

Bruker Biflex III MALDI-TOFMS
The BiflexTM III is a reflectron MALDI-TOFMS. This instrument can be used for the rapid analysis of a large variety of samples including peptides, proteins, synthetic polymers, oligonucleotides, and higher molecular weight organic materials. In external calibration mode, the mass accuracy on this instrument is typically about 0.5%. Mass accuracy can be improved to 0.1-0.2% with internal calibration.

Micromass GCT-MS
This is a compact, fully integrated, high performance, orthogonal acceleration time-of-flight (1.2 meters) GC-MS also equipped with solid probe applications. The source options on this instrument include Electron Impact (EI), Chemical Ionization (CI) and Field Ionization (FI). It can provide full mass spectra with resolution up to ~7000 FWHM which allows good mass accuracy with a single internal reference mass. The instrument has NIST GC Compound Library search capabilities to facilitate the identification of unknowns.

VARIAN 3800 GC-MS and HP 6890 GC/MSD System
Unlike other instruments in the facility, the GC/MSD System and the VARIAN 3800 GC-MS instruments are available for "self run" samples in an open access environment. These instruments are equipped with standard Electron Impact sources (EI).