Fig. 3: Full recoil-frame covariance map images.

The covariance map images between all ion species produced from FLU. Axis labels refer to the number of carbons in the monocationic species and omit the number of hydrogen atoms. Fragment ion pairs that have a total number of carbons greater than that of the parent ion, for example, between C₈H\({}_{x}^{+}\) and C₉H\({}_{x}^{+}\), show no covariance as they cannot be formed as partners from the same parent molecule; these have been omitted for clarity. Any ion species will also always show covariance with itself (autocovariance), and these entries have also been omitted. Notably, signal in the cells along the main diagonal of the matrix (highlighted in black) corresponds to the two-body dissociation pathways from the FLU²⁺ ion. In addition, the cells highlighted in blue and red correspond to the dissociation pathways where two and four carbon atoms, respectively, are lost in neutral co-fragments. Inset: expansions for the maps corresponding to cov(C₁₀H\({}_{x}^{+}\), C₃H\({}_{y}^{+}\)), cov(C₈H\({}_{x}^{+}\), C₃H\({}_{y}^{+}\)), cov(C₆H\({}_{x}^{+}\), C₃H\({}_{y}^{+}\)) showing increased blurring as more carbon atoms are lost in neutral co-fragments. The black arrow indicates the direction of the reference ion in all covariance maps.