Characterisation of biological material with ToF-SIMS: A review

Time of flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) has the unique ability to simultaneously obtain chemical information (elemental and molecular) with its spatial distribution on a subcellular scale. Recent progress in instrumentation, in particular the developments of cluster ion beam sources, has resulted in a growing interest in applying ToF-SIMS to a range of biological samples. In this review, the instrumental and methodological approaches responsible for this interest are presented along with some examples where the technique has been successfully applied.