Waters and the Canada-based Phytronix Technologies Inc have entered into a collaborative agreement to develop a high throughput solution (HTS) which will be based on the Phytronix Laser Diode Thermal Desorption (LDTD) Ion Source. The LDTD Technology combined with Waters MS/MS is geared towards high throughput applications in drug discovery, research, toxicology, forensics, food safety and environmental monitoring.

The LDTD Ion Source uses a ‘shotgun’ approach to introduce a sample by a rapid laser thermal desorption process into Waters MS/MS by ionizing it via atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI).

The source hardware is now available from Phytronix while the software drivers compatible with Waters MassLynx mass spectrometry software are expected to be available by the end of September.

“Working in tandem, LDTD-Waters MS/MS, offers a full MS analysis in less than four seconds sample to sample for both quantitative and qualitative applications in high-throughput environments,” said Jean Lacoursière, president, Phytronix.

“This non-invasive ion source completely integrated with Waters Xevo family of MS/MS systems provides the best of both worlds to the Waters users. The users can switch between Waters Acquity UPLC-MS/MS and LDTD-MS/MS easily for a maximum of versatility,” said Steve Smith, senior director - MS Product Management,Waters Division.

Both models manufactured by Phytronix, the LDTD-W960 with 96-well plate (LazWell-96) and LDTD-W3840 with the 384-well plate (LazWell-384) are now available for Waters Xevo TQ & Xevo TQ-S high performance tandem quadrupole MS/MS systems as well as for Waters’ installed base of older MS/MS instruments.

This robust combination offers new high throughput capabilities to the users of Waters MS systems and allows LDTD users to take full advantage of the Xevo TQ’s advanced capabilities which include the simultaneously monitoring of background information and the collection of high sensitivity product ion MS/MS spectra whilst performing quantitative MRM analysis.