Patent ID: 9063162
Filing Date: 2015-06-23
Classification: G01N,G16B,G16C,H01J

Abstract:
1. A method for identifying compounds in a sample comprising: processing said sample using a chromatographic separation apparatus and a mass spectrometer to obtain sample data including precursor ion information for precursor ions and product ion information for product ions derived from compounds in the sample, said precursor ion information for each of said precursor ions including a mass and a retention time for said each precursor ion, said product ion information for each of the product ions including a mass and a retention time for said each product ion; determining a list of raw matches between masses and retention times of precursor and product ion information of said sample data and masses and retention times of precursor and product ion information associated with a plurality of known compounds in a database; identifying a first of the plurality of known compounds in the sample by matching masses and retention times of a first set of precursor ion information and product ion information of the first compound from the database to masses and retention times of a second set of precursor ion information and product ion information from the list of raw matches, said first set including precursor information for precursor ions and associated product ions for the first compound, said first compound having a highest abundance of any identified one of the plurality of known compounds in the sample; removing from the list of raw matches said second set of precursor ion information and product ion information thereby obtaining a revised list of raw matches; and repeating said identifying and said removing using the revised list of raw matches to identify a second of the plurality of known compounds.