Abstract: A tandem mass spectrometry system, capable of obtaining tandem mass spectra for each parent ion without separation of parent ions of differing mass from each other, comprising an ion source, (1) a particle detector (6), two separated time-of-flight devices (3, 5) between the source and the detector, a control ion-excitation device (4) between the time-of-flight devices, and means measuring a time-of-flight for particles reaching the detector (6), all of which lie on a common ion path, and wherein ion optics maintain ion flight from the source within the ion path and a computer control system controls the excitation device (4) and the optics.

Abstract: A mass spectrometry system includes a double-focusing magnetic sector mass spectrometer and a time-of-flight spectrometer arranged in parallel. The spectrometers share a common means for exciting ions from a sample, and a common transfer optics system. An interleaved control system for the two spectrometers, is arranged also to control a sampling handling arrangement dependent on the output of the time-of-flight spectrometer, so as to enable the double-focusing magnetic sector mass spectrometer to analyze a region of interest on a sample.