Outside Users




This introductory course is intended for students of organic and inorganic chemistry who intend to make use of NMR in their research. The course is descriptive rather than mathematical and does not use quantum mechanics. The focus of the class is technique and not the interpretation of spectra. The class is practical in that ideas will be presented so that, for example, the student will be able to maximize spectral signal-to-noise, or choose the appropriate NOE experiment, or understand when solvent suppresion is needed. The course only meets once per week and is taught in Spring semester only.


Textbook: - High-Resolution NMR Techniques in Organic Chemistry, Claridge, Timothy D. W., Pergamon and

Basic One- and Two-dimensional NMR Spectroscopy, Horst Friebolin, Wiley-VCH 3rd edition 1998.


Course syllabus

Class 1: Intro to Basic NMR: Vector diagram picture of NMR. Review of simple 1D spectra: chemical shifts and couplings.. Reading: Friebolin pp 1-12, 22-40

Class 2, 3: Chemical Aspects: Magnetic and chemical equivalence, Pople notation, First order/second order spectra, energy level diagrams. Karplus relationship, Reading: Friebolin pp 70-77, 85-99, 111-126.

Class 3: Survey of info provided by 2D NMR Methods: COSY, DQF-COSY, ROESY, NOESY, HMQC, HMBC, TOCSY, etc….

Class 4: Demonstration of instrument operation in room 208 Havemeyer: Those who already have passwords to the NMR instruments need not attend.

Class 5,6: Basic NMR theory pulses, precession, and detection in terms of the vector diagram and FID, T1 and T2 relaxation, spin echoes, factors affecting sensitivity, selective and hard pulses, Reading: Friebolin pp 10-18, Claridge Chapter 2, and sections 3.2.1, 4.1, 4.2.1, 7.3, 6.2, 4.4 (p129 only).

Class 7,8: Instrumental aspects principles of shimming and resolution, FIDs and FT, spectral windows and offsets, digitization and alaising, digital resolution, dynamic range, window functions, overview of instrumental hardware. Reading: Claridge sections 3.1 through 3.4.

Class 9,10,11 Relaxation, NOE theory and Applications 2 spin energy level diagram, qualitative description of relaxation, relaxation mechanisms, motional dependence, description of NOE effect, steady state and dynamic NOE, motional dependence of NOE, 3 spin and chemical exchange effects, 1D vs. 2D, experimental considerations, interpretation. Reading: Claridge Chapter 8.

Class 12 Experimental 2D NMR what is a 2D experiment?. Reading: Claridge: sections 5.1, 5.3 (optional)

Class 13 Chemical exchange. Reading: Friebolin pp 301-325.

Time permitting - Heteronuclear NMR solid state NMR