Mass spectrometry Imaging (MSI) is a rapidly maturing analytical technology allowing the spatial distribution of many different molecules to be mapped across complex surfaces such as biological tissue sections. It achieves this in a label-free manner whilst combining all the advantages of modern mass spectrometry (i.e. sensitivity, specificity, structure elucidation capabilities, etc.) and can nowadays achieve spatial resolutions allowing for cellular and, in some cases, even sub-cellular resolution. Since the emergence of biomolecular MSI in the early late 1980s/early 1990s, the field has experienced significant growth and continued to increase its foothold in the chemical, physical and biological sciences (Fig. 1). Over this time, the scientific community has contributed to numerous developments that improved MSI’s analytical capabilities as well as methods to deal with the ever-increasing data demands these bring. This rapid growth across both academia and industry has catalyzed increasing interest from instrument vendors who are continuing to develop increasingly advanced commercial instrumentation and software solutions.

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Number per year of scientific papers containing topical keywords « Mass Spectrometry Imaging » according to a Web of Science search on February 15, 2021

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This rapidly increasing MSI performance is now being applied in an increasing number of settings and to samples and molecular classes that previously presented significant challenges. However, users’ demands constantly evolve and require more resolution, more sensitivity, and more accessible molecular classes to meet the demands of new applications. These increasing demands necessitate increasingly sophisticated data analysis routines to allow one to extract all the meaningful data from large datasets that are now routinely many GBs in size.

The 19 articles in this topical collection entitled “Mass Spectrometry Imaging 2.0” encompass many MSI-related techniques and include critical reviews of highly active and growing areas of research as well as communications and research papers describing advances across all areas of MSI, including sample preparation, new experimental approaches, as well as developments in quantitation and data analysis.

We sincerely thank all the authors for their timely contributions and the reviewers for critically assessing and improving these high-quality papers for this special topical collection on “Mass Spectrometry Imaging 2.0” of Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, especially under the challenging circumstances that affected all of us in 2020. We are also incredibly grateful to the editorial office for the efforts in helping compile this collection. We are very proud of the quality of contributions to this topical collection, and we hope it serves as a valuable resource for both new and experienced researchers and users in the field.