mMass

mMass presents open source multi-platform package of tools for precise mass spectrometric data analysis and interpretation. It is written in Python language and released under GNU General Public License, so it’s portable to different computer platforms and has a good potential to be easily modified or extended by modules of specific needs.

Spectrum Manipulation

Since most time in data interpretation is spent manipulating spectra (e.i. moving, shifting, scaling, zooming etc.), I aimed to make these functions as easy and user friendly as possible. There are no specific buttons or menu items hidden deep inside the application menu just to zoom spectrum. Everything is accessible by mouse, keyboard or combination of both. Vertical spectra flipping, Gel View or Spectrum Offset can be used to effectively compare your sample with any standard or blank spectrum. In addition, Spectrum Viewer not only provides for spectrum visualization, but also offers some other useful features such as peak labeling and distance measurements.

Multiple Format Support

mMass supports several mass spectrometry formats, such as mzData, mzXML and mzML. Mass spectra or peaklist data can also be easily imported from simple ASCII files consisting of two columns (m/z values and intensity values) separated by a tab, space, comma or semicolon. In addition, there is a support for raw data from Bruker's instruments (CompassXport tool needs to be installed on your computer, available for free on www.bdal.de).

mMass is so-called single-spectrum-editor therefore experiments such as LC-MS runs cannot be analyzed by mMass. However, it is possible to open any selected scan from such runs to analyze it separately if necessary.

One of the popular features of mMass is the ability to open a blank document and create peaklist manually. This feature is particularly useful in those cases where spectrum image or printed list of labelled peaks is available only.

Data Processing

mMass offers number of common data processing functions such as data crop, baseline correction, smoothing, peak picking, charging and de-isotoping. In order to avoid permanent changing of parameters and speed up the processing of data from different instruments you can define your own processing presets and use it frequently. For smoothing and baseline correction a preview is available and recommended to use before applying to your data.