Tuning Retention Times in the MassHunter Productivity App

Created by Agilent over 3 years ago | Last modified by kristen.sensabaugh over 3 years ago

For methods with retention times (RTs), the MassHunter Productivity App allows a user to automatically update a method's RT values based on analyzed data. This behavior is especially crucial for the Productivity App because custom methods added to the App become frozen. This means the App will create a private copy of the method so that changes to the original method will not affect the method referenced by the App (for more info, see Considerations when Adding Custom Methods to the MassHunter Productivity App). The ability to automatically maintain valid retention times means that less time is spent managing methods and more time is spent collecting data.

The tune function will attempt to update the retention times of all the analyzed compounds with retention time values from the highest concentration calibration standards. Thus, we recommend using this function with calibration samples of sufficient concentration such that all compounds can be found by the integrator. If a new retention time change is greater than the RT window, the app will prompt for confirmation before completing the RT tune. When running an RT tune, the RT window temporarily expands to 200% of the original window to increase the chances of seeing the peak. After applying RT tune run adjustments, the RT window is restored to its original value.

The tune functionality is available from either the Setup or Review views:

When started from the Setup view, the App will run the given sequence and method and automatically tune the method with the results. Because the tune functionality depends on calibration samples, the option will only be enabled if the sequence contains calibration samples and compounds are selected.

When started from the Review view, the App will use the currently opened results to perform the tune. If there are no Calibration samples in the opened results, the option will not be enabled.

Note:

There are some limitations to the tune function. For example, you currently cannot choose to update the RTs of a subset of the analyzed compounds, and you cannot change the updated RT window value. If this functionality will not work with your lab, let us know! We already have several planned upgrades to make this feature more flexible, but the more information we have, the better!

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