Decreased Gap Width in a Cylindrical High-Field Asymmetric Waveform Ion Mobility Spectrometry Device Improves Protein Discovery

High-field asymmetric waveform ion mobility spectrometry (FAIMS) is an atmospheric pressure ion mobility technique that separates gas phase ions according to their characteristic dependence of ion mobility on electric field strength. FAIMS can be implemented as a means of automated gas-phase fractionation in liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) experiments. We modified a commercially available cylindrical FAIMS device by enlarging the inner electrode, thereby narrowing the gap and increasing the effective field strength. This modification provided a nearly 4-fold increase in FAIMS peak capacity over the optimally configured unmodified device. We employed the modified FAIMS device for on-line fractionation in a proteomic analysis of a complex sample and observed major increases in protein discovery. NanoLC-FAIMS-MS/MS of an unfractionated yeast tryptic digest using the modified FAIMS device identified 53% more proteins than were identified using an unmodified FAIMS device and 98% more proteins than were identified with unaided nanoLC-MS/MS. We describe here the development of a nanoLC-FAIMS-MS/MS protocol that provides automated gas-phase fractionation for proteomic analysis of complex protein digests. We compare this protocol against prefractionation of peptides with isoelectric focusing and demonstrate that FAIMS fractionation yields comparable protein recovery while significantly reducing the amount of sample required and eliminating the need for additional sample handling.