Ambient Mass Spectrometry from the point of view of Green Analytical Chemistry

A recent subdiscipline of mass spectrometry that has undergone a relentless growth is ambient mass spectrometry (Ambient MS). This realm, coined first by R. Graham Cooks (Science, 2004, 306, 1571–1573), refers to the ability of interrogating samples in their native state (solid, liquid, or gas) using atmospheric pressure sampling mass spectrometry with minimal or even no sample preparation. In this experiment, sample and analyte ionization takes place at ambient conditions together with desorption of the species from the studied sample, if applies; ions are thus generated outside the MS instrument and subsequently mass analyzed. This feature maps well against the Green Analytical Chemistry principles particularly when Ambient MS is implemented in low-power-consumption portable mass spectrometry instrumentation. This article provides a glimpse of Ambient MS from the Green Analytical Chemistry perspective, including illustrative examples on recent applications of societal impact including clinical diagnosis, food safety, environmental monitoring, forensics, or homeland security.