High-Field Asymmetric Waveform Ion Mobility Separation and its Application to Small Molecule Analysis

High field asymmetric-waveform ion mobility spectrometry (FAIMS), also commonly referred to as differential mobility spectrometry (DMS), is an atmospheric pressure gas phase separation technique which exploits the difference between the mobility of an ion under high and low electric field conditions, as they pass between two electrodes. FAIMS can either be employed as a standalone mobility device or used as an orthogonal pre-separation technique hyphenated with chromatography and/or mass spectrometry. This report will discuss the development of modern FAIMS instrumentation and its application to the analysis of small molecules and peptides.