DOE OSTI · 3023247
Advanced Polymer Characterization: Modular Operations for Spectral Alignment by Iterative Compression (MOSAIC)
Abstract
Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI) mass spectrometry encodes structural information across diverse homo- and copolymer ensembles, yet decrypting these spectra requires a systematic analytical approach. We introduce Modular Operations for Spectral Alignment by Iterative Compression (MOSAIC)─a general cipher algorithm that applies modular arithmetic to filter monomer-derived mass contributions and cluster MALDI peaks by nonconstitutional repeating units (non-CRUs). MOSAIC performs sequential modular operations using monomer mass differences as base units to compress complex spectral data, revealing end-group distributions and comonomer incorporation. As a demonstration, we applied MOSAIC to five copolymers formed by two different polymerization mechanisms. Furthermore, the resulting remainder–mass plots clearly resolve polymer homologs with distinct non-CRUs into visually apparent clusters, enabling intuitive assignment of mass spectral features.
Keep this discovery
Explore connections, maps & timelines
Wang, Hanlin M. [University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, IL (United States); University of California, Santa Barbara, CA (United States)] (ORCID:0009000043591881), Suslick, Benjamin A. [University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, IL (United States)] (ORCID:0000000264993625), Lundberg, David J. [Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (United States)], Lessard, Jacob J. [University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, IL (United States); University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT (United States)] (ORCID:0000000329626472), Xu, Zhenchuang [University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, IL (United States)], Choy, Mary A. [University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, IL (United States)] (ORCID:0009000413336328), Johnson, Jeremiah A. [Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (United States)] (ORCID:0000000191576491), Moore, Jeffrey S. [University of Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, IL (United States)] (ORCID:0000000158416269). 2025-07-18. Advanced Polymer Characterization: Modular Operations for Spectral Alignment by Iterative Compression (MOSAIC). https://doi.org/10.1021/acsmacrolett.5c00385
Cite the original work for its findings. Save a collection to share your selection of sources.