THE USE OF COINCIDENCE COUNTING MASS-SPECTROMETRY TO STUDY THE EMISSION AND METASTABLE DISSOCIATION OF CLUSTER IONS

Coincidence counting and time-of-flight mass spectrometry were used to study the coincidental emission of ions from single fission fragment impacts from an inorganic solid. Removal of interfering peaks is possi ble by observing those ions in coincidence with a mass peak unambiguou sly representative of the sample of interest, The use of coincidence a lso allows a direct study of the correlation of ions and neutrals form ed due to the metastable dissociation of ions while in the drift regio n of the spectrometer. Such studies allow insight into the structure o f cluster ions, which can aid in relating the cluster ion composition and structure back to that of the original solid.