The Potential for Ion Mobility in Pharmaceutical and Clinical Analyses

The pharmaceutical and clinical industries are imperative for the maintenance of global health and welfare and require accurate, reproducible, and high throughput analyses. Technological advancements, such as the development and implementation of liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS), have allowed for improvements in these areas, however there is still room for development. One way in which current analyses may be improved is by the implementation of ion mobility technology. Ion mobility has the capability to produce much more comprehensive data sets, by providing separation of isomers, as well as improving throughput, with separations being performed as fast as 60 ms. Here we will discuss the potential for ion mobility to assist in the two specific areas of glycosylation monitoring of biological drugs, and vitamin D analysis, as representatives of ion mobility’s potential in both the pharmaceutical and clinical industries, respectively, as well as the current hurdles of ion mobility adoption in both fields.