Short transient signals, a challenge for inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, a review

The ability to acquire and handle short transient signals is key in order to open new applications for inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), for example, in life sciences. Technological and methodological achievements are reviewed to show challenges and capabilities of short transients in ICP-MS technology or hyphenated techniques. The dynamic processes in the plasma need to be controlled or observed to assure quality of quantitative results. Most precise instrumentation is to date multiple collector sector field MS but drifting isotope ratios are observed in transient signals using these instruments, thus limiting precision of such measurements and leaving unknowns in quantitative results. TOFMS in principle provides fast simultaneous multi-element detection, scanning instruments like quadrupole MS or scanning sector field MS are fundamentally restricted. However, new commercial ICP-MS instruments can be expected in the near future, making short transients more and more attractive to shorten acquisition times and to increase signal to noise ratio of element analyses.