MALDI of synthetic polymers - an update

Recent advances in MALDI of synthetic polymers is reviewed. The review will be limited in scope and not comprehensive, but will focus on areas where there has been significant progress and/or where some opportunities lie. Ion formation mechanisms for polymers still remain somewhat elusive. Advances in studies of protonation mechanisms need to be-extended to synthetic polymers to answer the question why the latter seem to largely prefer cationization over proton addition. There has been significant progress in the MS/MS of synthetic polymers, mostly by collision-induced dissociation and post-source decay. New and interesting results have been reported, but this area requires further investigation. The combination of MALDI with separation methods for synthetic polymers shows considerable potential and various applications are appearing. Of particular interest is coupling to size-exclusion chromatography and how to perform measurements on-line and in real time. Determination of polymer structure is possible including end-group analysis, derivatization, and analysis for embedded chain segments. Finally, novel solid-state supports have been reported, offering great potential for MALDI generally and polymer MALDI specifically. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.