A Review of Mass Spectrometry as an Important Analytical Tool for Structural Elucidation of Biological Products

Abstract

Mass spectrometry (MS) is one of the most versatile analytical measurement tools available to scientists today and finds application in virtually most aspects of chemistry research. MS is an efficient method to elucidate the structure and chemical composition of different samples or molecule. Recently, it has been used to classify biological products, in particular proteins and protein complexes, in a number of species. The success of mass spectrometry is driven both by innovative instrumentation designs, especially those operating on the time-of-flight or ion-trapping principles, and by large-scale biochemical strategies, which use mass spectrometry to detect the isolated proteins. Due to MS capability to distinguish between substances, it is used to identify unknown substances and its isotopes. When compared with other analytical tools or orthogonal methods used in analytical laboratories, mass spectrometers are often used as it has less background interference since it is performed in a vacuum. The increase in sensitivity and resolution of the MS has opened new dimensions for structural elucidation of biological products. In this review, the recent research application of MS techniques for the structural elucidation of some biological products was presented.