Spectrum of charged particle oscillations in an RF quadrupole field

Variations in the spectral composition of ion oscillations within several stability regions of a quadrupole mass filter were studied. The frequency spectrum was shown to consist of two line systems. Side lines ω_n=nω₀±βω₀/2 were observed in the oscillation spectrum near harmonics nω₀ (n=0, 1, 2,...), where ω₀ is the circular frequency of an RF field and β is the stability parameter. Near the boundaries of the stability regions, the oscillations took the form of beatings. For even values of the stability parameter, β=2k (k=1, 2,...), the beat frequency coincides with the fundamental frequency ω₀ and, for β=2k?1, the main beat frequencies are ω₀/2 and 3ω₀/2.