Congratulations to Julia Greenwald, who was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship!

Julia Greenwald, a first year graduate student in the Bush Lab, was recently awarded a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship! From the NSF:

The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based Master’s and doctoral degrees at accredited United States institutions. (For additional information, click here.)

Prof. Bush to receive the 2017 Arthur F. Findeis Award

Prof. Bush has been named the recipient of the 2017 Arthur F. Findeis Award for Achievements by a Young Analytical Scientist. The Findeis Award is given annually by the American Chemistry Society Division of Analytical Chemistry, to recognize and encourage outstanding contributions to the fields of analytical chemistry by a young analytical scientist. The award will be presented at the 254th ACS National Meeting to be held August 20-24, 2017 in Washington DC. (Link to additional information about the award)

New Publication: Native-Like and Denatured Cytochrome c Ions Yield Cation-to-Anion Proton Transfer Reaction Products with Similar Collision Cross-Sections


Native-like and Denatured Cytochrome c Ions Yield Cation-to-Anion Proton-Transfer Products with Similar Collision Cross Sections. Kenneth J. Laszlo, John H. Buckner, Eleanor B. Munger, Matthew F. Bush. J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 2017, in press. (Link)

The relationship between structures of protein ions, their charge states, and their original structures prior to ionization remains challenging to decouple. Here, we use cation-to-anion proton transfer reactions (CAPTR) to reduce the charge states of cytochrome c ions in the gas phase, and ion mobility to probe their structures. Ions were formed using a new temperature-controlled nanoelectrospray ionization source Continue reading “New Publication: Native-Like and Denatured Cytochrome c Ions Yield Cation-to-Anion Proton Transfer Reaction Products with Similar Collision Cross-Sections”

New Publication: Effects of drift gas selection on the ambient-temperature, ion mobility mass spectrometry analysis of amino acids

Effects of drift gas selection on the ambient-temperature, ion mobility mass spectrometry analysis of amino acids. Kimberly L. Davidson and Matthew F. Bush. Anal. Chem. 2017, DOI: 10.1021/acs.analchem.6b04605. (Link)

Ion mobility (IM) separates ions based on their response to an electric field in the presence of a drift gas. Due to its speed and sensitivity, the integration of IM and mass spectrometry (MS) offers many potential advantages for the analysis of small molecules. To determine the effects that drift gas selection has on the information content of IM separations, absolute collision cross sections (Ω) with He, N2, Ar, CO2, and N2O were measured for the 20 common amino acids using low-pressure, ambient-temperature ion mobility experiments performed in a radio-frequency-confining drift cell. Continue reading “New Publication: Effects of drift gas selection on the ambient-temperature, ion mobility mass spectrometry analysis of amino acids”

Analyst Most Accessed Articles in 2016

Congratulations to Sam Allen, whose article was one of the top 25 most downloaded articles published in the Analyst in 2016. That article is now featured in the Analyst 2016 Most Accessed Articles Collection.

  • Ion mobility mass spectrometry of peptide, protein, and protein complex ions using a radio-frequency confining drift cell. Samuel J. Allen, Kevin Giles, Tony Gilbert, Matthew F. Bush. Analyst 2016, 141, 884-891. (Link|PUBMED|PDF)

New Publication: Nonspecific aggregation in native electrokinetic nanoelectrospray ionization

Droplets_TOCNonspecific Aggregation in Native Electrokinetic Nanoelectrospray Ionization. Kimberly L. Davidson; Derek R. Oberreit; Christopher J. Hogan; Matthew F. Bush. Int. J. Mass Spectrom. 2016, DOI: 10.1016/j.ijms.2016.09.013. (Link)

Native mass spectrometry is widely used to determine the stoichiometries and binding constants of noncovalent interactions in solution. One challenge is that multiple analytes in a single electrospray droplet can aggregate during solvent evaporation, which will bias the distribution of oligomeric states observed during gas-phase measurements. Here, measurements of solution flow rates, electrospray currents, droplet size distributions, and nonspecific aggregation are used in conjunction with Poisson statistics to characterize the factors that control nonspecific aggregation during typical native mass spectrometry experiments. Continue reading “New Publication: Nonspecific aggregation in native electrokinetic nanoelectrospray ionization”