Agilent Technologies’ Mass Spectrometry Software Platform to Support All Agilent Instruments

Agilent Technologies Inc., (NYSE: A) chose the American Society of Mass Spectrometry meeting to announce that it is expanding its MassHunter Workstation software with many new functionalities, new modules and to support all Agilent mass spectrometers (MS).

Agilent’s MS portfolio now includes four single quadrupole liquid chromatograph/mass spectrometers (LC/MS), two Accurate-Mass Time-of-flight (TOF) LC/MS, three Accurate Mass Quadrupole TOF (Q-TOF) LC/MS, four Ion Trap LC/MS, two triple quadrupole LC/MS, a gas chromatograph/MS (GC/MS), a GC triple quadrupole MS and two inductively coupled plasma MS (ICP-MS) models.

MassHunter Workstation currently provides a single acquisition platform for Agilent TOF, Q-TOF and triple quadrupole LC/MS systems - with a single quadrupole coming soon -- and data processing for TOF, Q-TOF, triple quadrupole and single quadrupole LC/MS systems, ICP-MS systems. GC/MS and GC/MS/MS systems will come soon.

“Users will be able to access the benefits of MassHunter Workstation from the same familiar interface, with little or no learning curve,” said Frank Kuhlmann, Agilent LC/MS software product manager. “As the instruments achieve ever lower limits of detection and better mass accuracy, we’re designing the software to help customers easily harness this new power and achieve enormous productivity gains, especially in qualitative analysis.”

Agilent’s MassHunter Workstation is designed to streamline MS analysis, from instrument tuning through final report. Fully automated data analysis routines accommodate the high information content of the latest Accurate Mass TOF and Q-TOF systems. This enables users to find all compounds in samples, find differences between samples and sample sets, and easily confirm and identify unknowns.

MassHunter Workstation features an intuitive “flat” interface that lets users see all relevant information at a glance. Compound-centric data processing quickly generates answers from raw data, and the software automates many tasks to boost productivity. A powerful quantitation package eliminates tedious manual processing steps. Time-saving features such as a curve-fit assistant, dynamically linked results, outlier flagging, batch-at-a-glance data review and customizable views streamline analysis.

New Features

The introduction of MassHunter Workstation version B.02.00 supports Agilent’s new high-performance 6460 Triple Quadrupole LC/MS with Jet Stream ion focusing technology. New features include:

fast 100 ms polarity switching and fast multiple-reaction monitoring (up to 300 MRMs per second) for the 6460 triple quadrupole;
scheduled MRM for multi-compound methods to maximize dwell time and automatically set up overlapping time segments; and
interface with the new MassHunter Optimizer for compound-specific optimization for single- or multi-compound MRM methods. Applications include DMPK, food safety, environmental analysis, forensics and targeted quantitative proteomics.
MassHunter Workstation’s comprehensive data-mining functionality brings the highest level of certainty to confirmation and identification of unknowns. The advanced molecular-feature-extraction capability quickly and automatically turns highly complex LC/MS data files into a complete, accurate list of compounds or molecular features with molecular weight, retention time m/z and abundance.

MassHunter Workstation facilitates automated searches of compounds of interest against public and private accurate mass databases with the optional use of retention time, including Agilent’s METLIN Personal Database of metabolites and Spectrum Mill.

The new MassHunter BioConfirm software is now integrated with MassHunter Qualitative Analysis software for the analysis of proteins at the intact or digest level, as well as synthetic peptides. A new unique Large Molecule Feature Extractor will provide unprecedented performance for the analysis of complex protein mixtures.

MassHunter Workstation is also part of Agilent’s integrated mass profiling workflow, used to find the differences between two or more sample sets in metabolomics, proteomics and other applications.