Why is ICR inherently able to provide better resolution and mass accuracy than conventional mass spectrometers?
The main reason is that a superconducting magnet has a stability of a few parts per billion (ppb) per hour. Quadrupole and TOF instruments each require a voltage of ~1-10 keV, and it is (so far) not possible to stabilize such a voltage to better than ~1 part in 10,000. Ergo, FT-ICR has 10-100X higher resolving power.
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