mzRepeat: Visual analysis of lipids in mass spectrometry

Mass spectrometry is widely used for identifying molecules that have similar structures. A mass spectrum obtain from lipids using MALDI-MS (matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-mass spectrometer) was observed to have peaks at equal intervals on the m/z axis. If these repeated peaks can be collectively shown, analysis can be optimized even further. In this study, we propose a visualization system for analyzing repeated observed peaks on the m/z axis. The system, mzRepeat, was developed and evaluated by analyzing butter. A feature of mzRepeat is that ions that differ only in number of repeating structures are shown collectively. It is especially effective for analysis of many peaks from the samples that contain several molecular species.