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Survival of the fittest: Only those hexameric pyrogallarene and resorcinarene capsules which contain a guest with the right size, shape, and symmetry (see picture) survive the electrospray ionization process that makes them detectable by mass spectrometry. Tandem MS experiments with mass-selected ions provide evidence that the hexamers retain their capsular structure even in the gas phase.
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Beyeh et al. (2006) studied this question.
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