**Salient Characteristics for GC-MSD System**

**Overview**

The system shall include a capillary gas chromatograph (GC) instrument
with a thermal conductivity detector, a mass selective detector, a
vacuum system, and a data acquisition and analysis system. The mass
selective detector (MSD) shall be capable of EI (electron impact
ionization) and positive chemical ionization (PCI). Negative chemical
ionization (NCI) operation shall be available with a field upgradeable
ion source. The system shall have an autosampler, capable of controlling
the injection of from at least 0.1 microliters to 10 microliters of
liquid and shall be capable of holding at least 8 sample vials.**\
**

**Support and Training**

Installation, checkout, and training shall be accomplished by the
contractor after delivery. Training shall consist of start-up and
operation procedures. The actual date of checkout and training shall be
determined by the Government and the Government shall notify the
Contractor, in writing, ten (10) calendar days before this effort is to
begin. Checkout and training shall demonstrate that the equipment is
performing according to the salient characteristics. Checkout and
training shall consist of a minimum of one workday.

A warranty of at least one-year shall be provided.

**Mass Selective Detector**

The MSD shall occupy a space no larger than (0.5 m in length x 0.5 m in
width and 1.5 m in height)

The MSD shall not require cooling water or compressed air for operation.

The MSD shall operate on 120 VAC or 200--240 VAC.

The MSD shall include an interface to the GC that which has temperature
control to at least 250 C. The interface shall be less than 20 cm. in
length.

The MSD shall have an independently heated electron impact ion source, a
quadrupole mass filter, an electronics module, LAN communications, and
an off-axis high-energy dynode detector that is easily replaceable.

***Mass range***

The mass range shall be at least 1.6--800 amu in 0.1 amu steps; any
subset of this range

shall be selectable by the user.

***Mass resolution***

There shall be unit mass resolution throughout the mass range.

***Scan speed***

Scan rates shall be capable of at least 6 scans through the entire mass
range per second with a 0.1 amu scan step size.

***Dynamic range***

Total ADC (analog/digital converter) dynamic range shall be at least
1,000,000.

***Mass axis stability***

Mass axis stability shall be at least ±0.15 amu over 12 hours if the
instrument is operated at constant temperature.

***SIM (single ion monitoring) capability***

SIM capability shall be up to at least 50 groups of masses, with at
least 30 masses per group, which shall automatically be switchable
within an analysis by time-programming during acquisition.

***SIM dwell time***

SIM dwell time shall be at least any value between 10--9,999 msecs per
mass, selectable

by the instrument operator.

***Ionization energy***

Filament voltage shall be user-selectable over the range of at least
5--240 eV. There shall be at least two filaments for EI and at least one
filament for CI.

***Ionization current***

Filament emission current shall be user-selectable over the range of at
least 0--315 microamps in all modes of operation.

***Ion source temperature***

Temperature of the independently heated ion source shall be controllable
up to 250°C for EI and up to 300°C for CI.

***Quadrupole temperature***

Temperature of the independently heated quadrupole shall be controllable
up to 200°C.

***Interface temperature***

Temperature of the interface (an auxiliary zone of the GC) shall be
controllabled up to 350°C.

***Vacuum systems***

The vacuum system shall provide for a Gas Flow Rate Entering the MSD of
at least 2.0 (mL/min) using a turbopump and mechanical backing pump.

Pump-down from atmosphere to operating pressures shall require less than
3 minutes.

Time to reach stable operating temperature shall be 2 hours or less.

Venting the system to atmospheric pressure shall require less than 60
minutes.

***Local control panel***

A panel with a display and push buttons shall be provided to allow the
user to verify system performance locally, to start a method or
sequence, to vent the MSD,

and to monitor the status without interacting with the control software.

***ISO 9001***

The products shall be designed and manufactured under a quality system
that has been

registered to ISO 9001.

***Sensitivity***

The performance of the complete instrument (GC-MSD) shall have the
capability to do the following:

***EI Scan Sensitivity***

Shall yield an RMS signal/noise of at least 20:1 at m/z=272 when 1
picogram of octofluoronapthlene is injected into the GC, the scan rate
is 2.9 scan/sec, and the scan mass range is set to 50-300 amu.

## EI SIM sensitivity

Shall yield an RMS signal/noise of at least 10:1 at m/z=272 when 20
femtograms of octofluoronapthlene is injected into the GC, the scan rate
is 1.9 scan/sec, and the dwell time at m/z=272 is s set to 500 msecs.

***PCI Scan Sensitivity***

With methane (CH4) CI reagent gas shall yield an RMS signal/noise of at
least 75:1 at m/z=183.1 when 100 picorgrams of octofluoronapthlene is
injected into the GC, the scan rate is 4.7 scan/sec, and the scan mass
range is set to 80-230 amu.

**Control Hardware/Software**

The control hardware for the GC-MSD system shall be a laptop computer.
Connections from the computer to the instrument shall be LAN
connections.

The GC-MSD system shall be controlled with software that runs under the
Microsoft Windows 2000 operating system.

Software shall allow the user full instrument control of the system,
including the GC, MSD, and any additional GC detectors. Operating
software shall include autotune and target tune programs for EI, PCI and
NCI techniques along with programs for data acquisition, data editing,
reporting, quantification, library searching, and data analysis.

***Tuning***

Shall include autotune algorithms to tune the instrument for maximum
sensitivity or for specific target compounds. For chemical ionization,
there shall be automated tuning procedures to facilitate the adjustment
of reagent gas and mass analyzer parameters. All mass spectrometric
parameters shall be individually controllable by a highly interactive
manual tune program.

***Data acquisition***

Shall allow acquisition of up to 4 system detectors: GC, MSD, and
combined GC/MSD.

Any one MSD controller shall control a maximum of two MSDs.

# Data display

When used with the GC the system shall allow real-time display of MS and
GC signals and MS spectra; off-line display of multiple signals (TIC,
SIM, spectra); capabilities for

overlay, subtraction, zoom, user-definable attributes (axes, baselines,
compound names, fonts, scaling).

***Warning/alarm levels***

When used with the GC shall allow user-settable limits for signal
monitors that monitor MS and chromatographic signals and instrument
parameters; shall be able to be edited and saved for specific
applications.

***GC instrument parameters***

When used with the GC shall allow complete electronic pneumatic control
of all gas pressures and flow rates, Cryo-Blast, time-programming,
heated zones, oven temperatures (including ramp rates), cryogenic
cooling, valves, and signals.

***Integration***

At least two chromatographic integrators shall be provided (one
optimized for GC detector data and one optimized for mass spectrometric
data); manual and automatic integration for area or height. Integration
parameter files allow setting the area rejection, peak width, noise
threshold, baseline control parameters, negative peak tangent skim, area
sum. Custom integration parameter files are saved with methods.

***Calibration***

Up to 1,000 compounds shall be individually calibrated with up to 20
levels by using peak area or height, and a choice of five curve fits:
linear, linear with forced zero intercept, quadratic, quadratic with
forced zero intercept, and average response factors. System shall allow
weighted calibration for the inverse of concentration or the inverse
squared of the concentration. Calibration information for each compound
is viewable and includes target and qualifier ions, retention-time
windows, response factors, calibration curve plots, and coefficient of
determination.

***Quantitation***

System shall allow: Percent, normalized %, external standard %, internal

standard %, peak area, peak height, multilevel calibrations (up to 20
levels).

***User interface***

Shall be graphical and customizable, with simultaneous on-line and
off-line sessions supported.

***On-Line Help***

On-line help shall be accessible from all screens and accompanying
messaging; more than 1000 topics, glossary, and index shall be included.

***Training materials***

Electronic materials shall be accessible from the software application;
CD-ROM media shall include filmed maintenance procedures, and detailed
user-paced tutorials.

#### Mass spectral data base searching

Automated mass spectral data base searching shall be provided. Search
algorithms shall be compatible with other search algorithms that are
used with the commercial libraries.

***Reporting***

Shall include default reports; area %; Quant (summary and detailed);
library search (summary and detailed).

***Custom report templates***

Custom reporting shall utilizes a report wizard that shall simplify
creation of reports with a broad selection of graphical data types.
Report template shall support setting up user-created databases of
results from multiple samples, with automatic updating of data base
whenever a method is run. Custom report templates shall able to be
exported directly into Excel™.

***Customization***

Command set shall be grouped in "macros" that perform predefined
functions that users select to automate a series of keyboard entries.
Macros shall be initiated in pre-run, post-run, and sequence state.

***File formats***

Industry standard GC/MS AIA file formats shall be
importedable/exportable. Data files and reports can be exported as
".csv" files to third-party applications such as Excel™.

***Security***

Secured control shall allows the system manager to define multiple
levels of security for methods and data files, integration, quantitation
and reporting, total system accessibility, method-specific
accessibility, and equilibration/stand-by methods.

***Processing tools***

Real-time update of concentration, peak integration, retention times;
screening for false negatives; QA check reporting; batch processing of
samples or spectra shall be included.

***Automation***

Shall include pre-method and post-method routines, recalibrations,
bracketing, pause for priority samples, capability for additional
samples online , reevaluation via data analysis.

#### Chromatographic repeatability tool

Closed-loop retention time locking (RTL) shall be provided in an
automated process for both acquiring RTL calibration information about
retention time changes resulting from

normal chromatographic operation and subsequently adjusting the
chromatographic pressure automatically to correct for retention time
deviations as appropriate.

***Early maintenance feedback***

Monitoring of system components that require routine maintenance for
appropriate performance, with messaging to the operator if user-defined
limits are exceeded shall be provided. This feedback skall include:
mechanical pump fluid changes, detector change based on EM counts,
injections per septum, injections per inlet liner, and tune-time limits.

***Year-2000 compliance***

Shall be certifiable Year-2000 compliant.

***Software validation***

Data files and methods shall be provided for validating the calculations
and algorithms that are used by the software in producing results (area
percent, summary library

search, summary quantitation reports).