Ammonium acetate is a chemical compound which is derived from the reaction of ammonia and acetic acid. Ammonium acetate is volatile at low pressures. Because of which it has been used to replace cell buffers with non-volatile salts, in preparing samples for mass spectrometry. It is used as a buffer for mobile phases for HPLC with ELSD detection.
Ammonium acetate is a widely used reagent in molecular biology and chromatography. Its applications include the purification and precipitation of DNA and protein crystallization. Ammonium acetate is commonly used in HPLC and MS analysis of various compounds, such as oligosaccharides, proteins, and peptides. Ammonium acetate is also used for the nonaqueous capillary electrophoresis-mass spectrometry (NACE-MS) of lipophilic peptides and therapeutic drugs.