Abstract
Abstract. Sulfuric acid and dimethylamine vapours in the atmosphere can form molecular clusters, which participate in new particle formation events. In this work, we have produced, measured, and identified clusters of sulfuric acid and dimethylamine using an electrospray ionizer coupled with a planar-differential mobility analyser, connected to an atmospheric pressure interface time-of-flight mass spectrometer (ESI–DMA–APi-TOF MS). This set-up is suitable for evaluating the extent of fragmentation of the charged clusters inside the instrument. We evaluated the fragmentation of 11 negatively charged clusters both experimentally and using a statistical model based on quantum chemical data. The results allowed us to quantify the fragmentation of the studied clusters and to reconstruct the mass spectrum by removing the artifacts due to the fragmentation.
Highlights
Our climate is heavily impacted by atmospheric aerosol particles
This type of data visualization allows us to evaluate the presence of multicharged compounds, the presence of fragmented clusters, and the range of m/z and mobility of the clusters produced in the electrospray ionizer (ESI)
This plot gives a convenient overview of the cluster fragmentation in the sulfuric acid–dimethylamine system
Summary
Our climate is heavily impacted by atmospheric aerosol particles. These particles play an important role in our daily lives. They determine the quality of the air we breathe and affect our health directly (Hirsikko et al, 2011; Zhao et al, 2021). A central tool in detecting the elemental composition of these clusters is the chemical ionization atmospheric pressure interface time-of-flight mass spectrometer (CI–APi-TOF MS) (Jokinen et al, 2012; Yao et al, 2018). Due to the lower stability of clusters in comparison to molecules, clusters are more susceptible to fragmentation and/or evaporation caused for example by ionization processes, low-pressure environments, and high-energy collisions inside the instrument. Cluster fragmentation processes inside the instrument (Olenius et al, 2013) have been speculated to be an explanation for this difference
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