Mass spectrometry analysis of the real-time transport of plasma-generated ionic species through an agarose tissue model target

With ambient mass spectrometry, we followed the transport of neutral gas species and ionic species through a 3.2 mm thick agarose tissue model target during He non-thermal atmospheric pressure plasma (NT-APP) jet treatment. We found that the neutral gas species are unable to efficiently penetrate the agarose target. But both positively and negatively charged ionic species readily penetrate through the agarose target, following an initial time-lag period of several minutes. Interestingly, we also found that the ionic species are easily hydrated. The trends in the He NT-APP jet transport of ionic species observed in this study correlate well with the He NT-APP jet transport of reactive oxygen and nitrogen species (RONS) through agarose tissue model targets that was investigated in previous studies. Therefore, mass spectrometry might prove to be a useful tool in the future for analyzing the dosages of NT-APP-generated RONS in real biological tissues.