A Fusion of High Resolution Tuneable MALDI MS with SIMS

With links increasingly being established between molecular markers and disease states there is a significant interest in techniques for imaging unlabelled molecules directly in tissue. Localised molecular information provides the opportunity to directly investigate the link between tissue structure and function, and mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) has been established as a powerful technique for achieving this. This project aims to improve the MSI spatial resolution, sensitivity and scope of targets through the combination of two major innovations. First, A new tuneable laser system for Matrix Assisted Laser Desorption Ionisation (MALDI) MSI will be developed to increase scope of analytes, sensitivity and resolution. Second, methods will be developed to fuse data from two MSI techniques (Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS) and MALDI). The flexibility of the new MALDI system will allow optimised fusion with SIMS images to provide further improvements in resolution and simplify data interpretation. The combined product will be a novel multi-mode biological imaging strategy with potential applications for combined metabolomic, lipidomic and proteomic research.