I am a graduate student in University of Warwick this year and I am come from Hong Kong. I completed my undergraduate degree, Chemistry in University of Warwick, I learned a lot of Chemistry basic during last 3 years. This year I applied for the taught Master degree (AS:MIT) in University of Warwick. The course of AS:MIT is basically divide into 2 sections, the first section is taught course, including the fundamental of the instruments and the data analyses of different techniques, e.g. NMR, FTICR-MS, HPLC, GC-MS, etc, and these are very useful in my future. The second part of the course is the research project and I chose FTICR-MS for my project, because I am interested in identify the compounds by mass spectrometry. In the future,

I would like to learn more about the mass spectrometry.

For my research project, I am working in Prof. Peter O'Connor groups. My project is to analysis beer using Fourier Transform Ion Cyclotron Resonance-Mass Spectrometry (FTICR-MS) and to identify the unknown compounds in it. Beer is a very popular drink around the world and lot of people love to drink it, which is why I am interested in and want to know more of it. FTICR-MS is a powerful technique for the investigation the complex mixture due to the high resolving power and mass accuracies obtained. As one of the examples, the FTICR mass spectrum of the beer, KIRIN ICHIBAN, in negative mode was shown in Figure 1 (below).

 

Figure 1 shows there a lot of peaks appear and to be identify, however it takes time to assign the ion peaks.

Based on the accurate mass, I calculated the chemical formulae for each peaks and I assigned

oligosaccharides (n=2-8) which is a simple sugar polymer in beers.

 

Figure 1. The full mass spectrum of beer, KIRIN ICHIBAN in negative mode

 

During this research project, I learned more knowledge of Chemistry from many talented and intelligent

people and was trained to use the FTICR-MS and GC-MS . Also, I had incolced to learn the new technique

of GC-APCI/FTICR-MS which I can be use for my project later on.