[1] The values of the m/z and time are defined in an inclusion list which is derived from a previous analysis.
In contrast, non-targeted analysis would, typically, only allow detection of the most abundant 50-100 ions over the entire experiment time.
There have been some efforts in automating the generation of inclusion lists through the solution of external software.
In 2010, Wu et al.[3] introduced a semi-automatic method in an effort of identifying low-abundance glyco-peptide.
In addition to the advantage mentioned before, this semi-automated approach also saves substantial amount of time and efforts for scientists in manually picking ions and re-calibrating instruments.