
Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, most commonly known as NMR spectroscopy or magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), is a
spectroscopic
Spectroscopy is the field of study that measures and interprets electromagnetic spectra. In narrower contexts, spectroscopy is the precise study of color as generalized from visible light to all bands of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Spectrosc ...
technique based on re-orientation of
atomic nuclei
The atomic nucleus is the small, dense region consisting of protons and neutrons at the center of an atom, discovered in 1911 by Ernest Rutherford at the University of Manchester based on the 1909 Geiger–Marsden gold foil experiment. Aft ...
with non-zero
nuclear spin
Nuclear may refer to:
Physics
Relating to the nucleus of the atom:
* Nuclear engineering
* Nuclear physics
* Nuclear power
* Nuclear reactor
* Nuclear weapon
* Nuclear medicine
*Radiation therapy
*Nuclear warfare
Mathematics
* Nuclear space
* ...
s in an external magnetic field. This re-orientation occurs with absorption of electromagnetic radiation in the
radio frequency
Radio frequency (RF) is the oscillation rate of an alternating electric current or voltage or of a magnetic, electric or electromagnetic field or mechanical system in the frequency range from around to around . This is roughly between the u ...
region from roughly 4 to 900 MHz, which depends on the
isotopic nature of the nucleus and increases proportionally to the strength of the external magnetic field. Notably, the resonance frequency of each NMR-active nucleus depends on its chemical environment. As a result, NMR spectra provide information about individual
functional group
In organic chemistry, a functional group is any substituent or moiety (chemistry), moiety in a molecule that causes the molecule's characteristic chemical reactions. The same functional group will undergo the same or similar chemical reactions r ...
s present in the sample, as well as about connections between nearby nuclei in the same molecule.
As the NMR spectra are unique or highly characteristic to individual compounds and
functional groups
In organic chemistry, a functional group is any substituent or moiety (chemistry), moiety in a molecule that causes the molecule's characteristic chemical reactions. The same functional group will undergo the same or similar chemical reactions r ...
, NMR spectroscopy is one of the most important methods to identify molecular structures, particularly of
organic compound
Some chemical authorities define an organic compound as a chemical compound that contains a carbon–hydrogen or carbon–carbon bond; others consider an organic compound to be any chemical compound that contains carbon. For example, carbon-co ...
s.
The principle of NMR usually involves three sequential steps:
# The alignment (polarization) of the magnetic nuclear spins in an applied, constant magnetic field B
0.
# The perturbation of this alignment of the nuclear spins by a weak oscillating magnetic field, usually referred to as a radio-frequency (RF) pulse.
# Detection and analysis of the electromagnetic waves emitted by the nuclei of the sample as a result of this perturbation.
Similarly, biochemists use NMR to identify
protein
Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residue (biochemistry), residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including Enzyme catalysis, catalysing metab ...
s and other complex molecules. Besides identification, NMR spectroscopy provides detailed information about the structure, dynamics, reaction state, and chemical environment of molecules. The most common types of NMR are
proton
A proton is a stable subatomic particle, symbol , Hydron (chemistry), H+, or 1H+ with a positive electric charge of +1 ''e'' (elementary charge). Its mass is slightly less than the mass of a neutron and approximately times the mass of an e ...
and
carbon-13 NMR
Carbon-13 (C13) nuclear magnetic resonance (most commonly known as carbon-13 NMR spectroscopy or 13C NMR spectroscopy or sometimes simply referred to as carbon NMR) is the application of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy to carbon. It ...
spectroscopy, but it is applicable to any kind of sample that contains nuclei possessing
spin
Spin or spinning most often refers to:
* Spin (physics) or particle spin, a fundamental property of elementary particles
* Spin quantum number, a number which defines the value of a particle's spin
* Spinning (textiles), the creation of yarn or thr ...
.
NMR spectra are unique, well-resolved, analytically tractable and often highly predictable for
small molecule
In molecular biology and pharmacology, a small molecule or micromolecule is a low molecular weight (≤ 1000 daltons) organic compound that may regulate a biological process, with a size on the order of 1 nm. Many drugs are small molecules; ...
s. Different
functional group
In organic chemistry, a functional group is any substituent or moiety (chemistry), moiety in a molecule that causes the molecule's characteristic chemical reactions. The same functional group will undergo the same or similar chemical reactions r ...
s are obviously distinguishable, and identical functional groups with differing neighboring substituents still give distinguishable signals. NMR has largely replaced traditional
wet chemistry
Wet chemistry is a form of analytical chemistry that uses classical methods such as observation to analyze materials. The term ''wet chemistry'' is used as most analytical work is done in the liquid phase. Wet chemistry is also known as ''bench c ...
tests such as
color reagents or typical chromatography for identification.
The most significant drawback of NMR spectroscopy is its poor sensitivity (compared to other analytical methods, such as
mass spectrometry
Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that is used to measure the mass-to-charge ratio of ions. The results are presented as a ''mass spectrum'', a plot of intensity as a function of the mass-to-charge ratio. Mass spectrometry is used ...
). Typically 2–50 mg of a substance is required to record a decent-quality NMR spectrum. The NMR method is non-destructive, thus the substance may be recovered. To obtain high-resolution NMR spectra, solid substances are usually dissolved to make liquid solutions, although
solid-state NMR
Solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (ssNMR) is a spectroscopy technique used to characterize atomic-level structure and dynamics in solid materials. ssNMR spectra are broader due to nuclear spin interactions which can be categorized as dipolar ...
spectroscopy is also possible.
The timescale of NMR is relatively long, and thus it is not suitable for observing fast phenomena, producing only an averaged spectrum. Although large amounts of impurities do show on an NMR spectrum, better methods exist for detecting impurities, as NMR is inherently not very sensitive though at higher frequencies, sensitivity is higher.
Correlation spectroscopy is a development of ordinary NMR. In
two-dimensional NMR
Two-Dimensional Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (2D NMR) is an advanced spectroscopic technique that builds upon the capabilities of one-dimensional (1D) NMR by incorporating an additional frequency dimension. This extension allows for a more compre ...
, the emission is centered around a single frequency, and correlated resonances are observed. This allows identifying the neighboring substituents of the observed functional group, allowing unambiguous identification of the resonances. There are also more complex 3D and 4D methods and a variety of methods designed to suppress or amplify particular types of resonances. In
nuclear Overhauser effect
The nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) is the transfer of spin polarization, nuclear spin polarization from one population of Spin (physics), spin-active nuclei (e.g. 1H, 13C, 15N etc.) to another via Relaxation (NMR), cross-relaxation. A phenomenolog ...
(NOE) spectroscopy, the
relaxation of the resonances is observed. As NOE depends on the proximity of the nuclei, quantifying the NOE for each nucleus allows construction of a three-dimensional model of the molecule.

NMR spectrometers are relatively expensive; universities usually have them, but they are less common in private companies. Between 2000 and 2015, an NMR spectrometer cost around 0.5–5 million
USD
The United States dollar (symbol: $; currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introduced the U.S. dollar at par with the Spanish silver dollar, divided it int ...
. Modern NMR spectrometers have a very strong, large and expensive
liquid-helium-cooled
superconducting
Superconductivity is a set of physical properties observed in superconductors: materials where electrical resistance vanishes and magnetic fields are expelled from the material. Unlike an ordinary metallic conductor, whose resistance decreases g ...
magnet, because resolution directly depends on magnetic field strength. Higher magnetic field also improves the sensitivity of the NMR spectroscopy, which depends on the
population difference between the two nuclear levels, which increases exponentially with the magnetic field strength.
Less expensive machines using permanent magnets and lower resolution are also available, which still give sufficient performance for certain applications such as reaction monitoring and quick checking of samples. There are even
benchtop nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer
A Benchtop nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer (Benchtop NMR spectrometer) refers to a Fourier transform nuclear magnetic resonance (FT-NMR) spectrometer that is significantly more compact and portable than the conventional equivalents, such th ...
s. NMR spectra of protons (
1H nuclei) can be observed even in
Earth magnetic field
Earth's magnetic field, also known as the geomagnetic field, is the magnetic field that extends from Earth's interior out into space, where it interacts with the solar wind, a stream of charged particles emanating from the Sun. The magne ...
. Low-resolution NMR produces broader peaks, which can easily overlap one another, causing issues in resolving complex structures. The use of higher-strength magnetic fields result in a better sensitivity and higher resolution of the peaks, and it is preferred for research purposes.
History
Credit for the discovery of NMR goes to
Isidor Isaac Rabi
Israel Isidor Isaac Rabi (; ; July 29, 1898 – January 11, 1988) was an American nuclear physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944 for his discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance, which is used in magnetic resonance imaging. H ...
, who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1944. The Purcell group at
Harvard University
Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...
and the Bloch group at
Stanford University
Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...
independently developed NMR spectroscopy in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Edward Mills Purcell
Edward Mills Purcell (August 30, 1912 – March 7, 1997) was an American physicist who shared the 1952 Nobel Prize for Physics for his independent discovery (published 1946) of nuclear magnetic resonance in liquids and in solids. Nuclear magn ...
and
Felix Bloch
Felix Bloch (; ; 23 October 1905 – 10 September 1983) was a Swiss-American physicist who shared the 1952 Nobel Prize in Physics with Edward Mills Purcell "for their development of new methods for nuclear magnetic precision measurements and di ...
shared the 1952
Nobel Prize in Physics
The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...
for their inventions.
NMR-active criteria
The key determinant of NMR activity in atomic nuclei is the nuclear spin quantum number (''I''). This intrinsic quantum property, similar to an atom's "
spin
Spin or spinning most often refers to:
* Spin (physics) or particle spin, a fundamental property of elementary particles
* Spin quantum number, a number which defines the value of a particle's spin
* Spinning (textiles), the creation of yarn or thr ...
", characterizes the angular momentum of the nucleus. To be NMR-active, a nucleus must have a non-zero nuclear spin (''I'' ≠ 0). It is this non-zero spin that enables nuclei to interact with external magnetic fields and show signals in NMR. Atoms with an odd sum of protons and neutrons exhibit half-integer values for the nuclear spin quantum number (''I'' = 1/2, 3/2, 5/2, and so on). These atoms are NMR-active because they possess non-zero nuclear spin. Atoms with an even sum but both an odd number of protons and an odd number of neutrons exhibit integer nuclear spins (''I'' = 1, 2, 3, and so on). Conversely, atoms with an even number of both protons and neutrons have a nuclear spin quantum number of zero (''I'' = 0), and therefore are not NMR-active. NMR-active nuclei, particularly those with a spin quantum number of 1/2, are of great significance in NMR spectroscopy. Examples include
1H,
13C,
15N, and
31P. Some atoms with very high spin (as 9/2 for
99Tc atom) are also extensively studied with NMR spectroscopy.
Main aspects of NMR techniques
Resonant frequency
When placed in a magnetic field, NMR active nuclei (such as
1H or
13C) absorb
electromagnetic radiation
In physics, electromagnetic radiation (EMR) is a self-propagating wave of the electromagnetic field that carries momentum and radiant energy through space. It encompasses a broad spectrum, classified by frequency or its inverse, wavelength ...
at a frequency characteristic of the
isotope
Isotopes are distinct nuclear species (or ''nuclides'') of the same chemical element. They have the same atomic number (number of protons in their Atomic nucleus, nuclei) and position in the periodic table (and hence belong to the same chemica ...
. The resonant frequency, energy of the radiation absorbed, and the intensity of the signal are proportional to the strength of the magnetic field. For example, in a 21-
tesla magnetic field,
hydrogen
Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...
nuclei (
proton
A proton is a stable subatomic particle, symbol , Hydron (chemistry), H+, or 1H+ with a positive electric charge of +1 ''e'' (elementary charge). Its mass is slightly less than the mass of a neutron and approximately times the mass of an e ...
s) resonate at 900 MHz. It is common to refer to a 21 T magnet as a 900
MHz
The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base u ...
magnet, since hydrogen is the most common nucleus detected. However, different nuclei will resonate at different frequencies at this field strength in proportion to their
nuclear magnetic moment
The nuclear magnetic moment is the magnetic moment of an atomic nucleus and arises from the spin of the protons and neutrons. It is mainly a magnetic dipole moment; the quadrupole moment does cause some small shifts in the hyperfine structure ...
s.
Sample handling

An NMR spectrometer typically consists of a spinning sample-holder inside a very strong magnet, a radio-frequency emitter, and a receiver with a probe (an antenna assembly) that goes inside the magnet to surround the sample, optionally gradient coils for diffusion measurements, and electronics to control the system. Spinning the sample is usually necessary to average out diffusional motion, however, some experiments call for a stationary sample when solution movement is an important variable. For instance, measurements of
diffusion constant
Fick's laws of diffusion describe diffusion and were first posited by Adolf Fick in 1855 on the basis of largely experimental results. They can be used to solve for the diffusion coefficient, . Fick's first law can be used to derive his second ...
s (''diffusion ordered spectroscopy'' or DOSY) are done using a stationary sample with spinning off, and flow cells can be used for online analysis of process flows.
Deuterated solvents
The vast majority of molecules in a solution are solvent molecules, and most regular solvents are
hydrocarbon
In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons are examples of group 14 hydrides. Hydrocarbons are generally colourless and Hydrophobe, hydrophobic; their odor is usually fain ...
s and so contain NMR-active hydrogen-1 nuclei. In order to avoid having the signals from solvent hydrogen atoms overwhelm the experiment and interfere in analysis of the dissolved analyte,
deuterated solvents
Deuterated solvents are a group of compounds where one or more hydrogen atoms are substituted by deuterium atoms.
These isotopologues of common solvents are often used in nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy.
Examples
* Heavy water
* Deuterat ...
are used where >99% of the protons are replaced with
deuterium
Deuterium (hydrogen-2, symbol H or D, also known as heavy hydrogen) is one of two stable isotopes of hydrogen; the other is protium, or hydrogen-1, H. The deuterium nucleus (deuteron) contains one proton and one neutron, whereas the far more c ...
(hydrogen-2). The most widely used deuterated solvent is
deuterochloroform (CDCl
3), although other solvents may be used for various reasons, such as solubility of a sample, desire to control
hydrogen bonding
In chemistry, a hydrogen bond (H-bond) is a specific type of molecular interaction that exhibits partial covalent character and cannot be described as a purely electrostatic force. It occurs when a hydrogen (H) atom, Covalent bond, covalently b ...
, or melting or boiling points. The chemical shifts of a molecule change slightly between solvents, and therefore the solvent used is almost always reported with chemical shifts.
Proton NMR
Proton nuclear magnetic resonance (proton NMR, hydrogen-1 NMR, or 1H NMR) is the application of nuclear magnetic resonance in NMR spectroscopy with respect to hydrogen-1 nuclei within the molecules of a substance, in order to determine the stru ...
spectra are often calibrated against the known solvent residual proton peak as an
internal standard
In a chemical analysis, the internal standard method involves adding the same amount of a chemical substance to each sample and calibration solution. The internal standard responds proportionally to changes in the analyte and provides a similar, bu ...
instead of adding tetramethylsilane (TMS), which is conventionally defined as having a chemical shift of zero.
Shim and lock
To detect the very small frequency shifts due to nuclear magnetic resonance, the applied magnetic field must be extremely uniform throughout the sample volume. High-resolution NMR spectrometers use
shims to adjust the homogeneity of the magnetic field to parts per billion (
ppb) in a volume of a few cubic centimeters. In order to detect and compensate for inhomogeneity and drift in the magnetic field, the spectrometer maintains a "lock" on the solvent deuterium frequency with a separate lock unit, which is essentially an additional transmitter and RF processor tuned to the lock nucleus (deuterium) rather than the nuclei of the sample of interest.
In modern NMR spectrometers shimming is adjusted automatically, though in some cases the operator has to optimize the shim parameters manually to obtain the best possible resolution.
Acquisition of spectra
Upon excitation of the sample with a radio frequency (60–1000 MHz) pulse, a nuclear magnetic resonance response a
free induction decay
In Fourier transform nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, free induction decay (FID) is the observable nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) signal generated by non-equilibrium nuclear spin magnetization precessing about the magnetic field (conve ...
(FID) is obtained. It is a very weak signal and requires sensitive radio receivers to pick up. A
Fourier transform
In mathematics, the Fourier transform (FT) is an integral transform that takes a function as input then outputs another function that describes the extent to which various frequencies are present in the original function. The output of the tr ...
is carried out to extract the frequency-domain spectrum from the raw time-domain FID. A spectrum from a single FID has a low
signal-to-noise ratio
Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR or S/N) is a measure used in science and engineering that compares the level of a desired signal to the level of background noise. SNR is defined as the ratio of signal power to noise power, often expressed in deci ...
, but it improves readily with averaging of repeated acquisitions. Good
1H NMR spectra can be acquired with 16 repeats, which takes only minutes. However, for elements heavier than hydrogen, the relaxation time is rather long, e.g. around 8 seconds for
13C. Thus, acquisition of quantitative heavy-element spectra can be time-consuming, taking tens of minutes to hours.
Following the pulse, the nuclei are, on average, excited to a certain angle vs. the spectrometer magnetic field. The extent of excitation can be controlled with the pulse width, typically about 3–8 μs for the optimal 90° pulse. The pulse width can be determined by plotting the (signed) intensity as a function of pulse width. It follows a
sine curve
A sine wave, sinusoidal wave, or sinusoid (symbol: ∿) is a periodic wave whose waveform (shape) is the trigonometric sine function. In mechanics, as a linear motion over time, this is '' simple harmonic motion''; as rotation, it correspon ...
and, accordingly, changes sign at pulse widths corresponding to 180° and 360° pulses.
Decay times of the excitation, typically measured in seconds, depend on the effectiveness of relaxation, which is faster for lighter nuclei and in solids, slower for heavier nuclei and in solutions, and can be very long in gases. If the second excitation pulse is sent prematurely before the relaxation is complete, the average magnetization vector has not decayed to ground state, which affects the strength of the signal in an unpredictable manner. In practice, the peak areas are then not proportional to the stoichiometry; only the presence, but not the amount of functional groups is possible to discern. An inversion recovery experiment can be done to determine the relaxation time and thus the required delay between pulses. A 180° pulse, an adjustable delay, and a 90° pulse is transmitted. When the 90° pulse exactly cancels out the signal, the delay corresponds to the time needed for 90° of relaxation. Inversion recovery is worthwhile for quantitative
13C,
2D and other time-consuming experiments.
Spectral interpretation
NMR signals are ordinarily characterized by three variables: chemical shift, spin–spin coupling, and relaxation time.
Chemical shift

The energy difference Δ''E'' between nuclear spin states is proportional to the magnetic field (
Zeeman effect
The Zeeman effect () is the splitting of a spectral line into several components in the presence of a static magnetic field. It is caused by the interaction of the magnetic field with the magnetic moment of the atomic electron associated with ...
). Δ''E'' is also sensitive to electronic environment of the nucleus, giving rise to what is known as the chemical shift, δ. The simplest types of NMR graphs are plots of the different chemical shifts of the nuclei being studied in the molecule. The value of δ is often expressed in terms of "shielding": shielded nuclei have higher Δ''E''. The range of δ values is called the dispersion. It is rather small for
1H signals, but much larger for other nuclei. NMR signals are reported relative to a reference signal, usually that of TMS (
tetramethylsilane
Tetramethylsilane (abbreviated as TMS) is the organosilicon compound with the formula Si(CH3)4. It is the simplest tetraorganosilane. Like all silanes, the TMS framework is tetrahedral. TMS is a building block in organometallic chemistry but als ...
). Additionally, since the distribution of NMR signals is field-dependent, these frequencies are divided by the spectrometer frequency. However, since we are dividing Hz by MHz, the resulting number would be too small, and thus it is multiplied by a million. This operation therefore gives a locator number called the "chemical shift" with units of parts per million.
The chemical shift provides structural information.
The conversion of chemical shifts (and J's, see below) is called ''assigning'' the spectrum. For diamagnetic organic compounds, assignments of
1H and
13C NMR spectra are extremely sophisticated because of the large databases and easy computational tools. In general, chemical shifts for protons are highly predictable, since the shifts are primarily determined by shielding effects (electron density). The chemical shifts for many heavier nuclei are more strongly influenced by other factors, including
excited state
In quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics is the fundamental physical Scientific theory, theory that describes the behavior of matter and of light; its unusual characteristics typically occur at and below the scale of atoms. Reprinted, Add ...
s ("paramagnetic" contribution to shielding tensor). This paramagnetic contribution, which is unrelated to
paramagnetism
Paramagnetism is a form of magnetism whereby some materials are weakly attracted by an externally applied magnetic field, and form internal, induced magnetic fields in the direction of the applied magnetic field. In contrast with this behavior, ...
) not only disrupts trends in chemical shifts, which complicates assignments, but it also gives rise to very large chemical shift ranges. For example, most
1H NMR signals for most organic compounds are within 15 ppm. For
31P NMR, the range is hundreds of ppm.
In
paramagnetic NMR spectroscopy, the samples are paramagnetic, i.e. they contain unpaired electrons. The paramagnetism gives rise to very diverse chemical shifts. In
1H NMR spectroscopy, the chemical shift range can span up to thousands of ppm.
J-coupling
Some of the most useful information for structure determination in a one-dimensional NMR spectrum comes from J-coupling, or scalar coupling (a special case of
spin–spin coupling
In quantum mechanics, angular momentum coupling is the procedure of constructing eigenstates of total angular momentum out of eigenstates of separate angular momenta. For instance, the orbit and spin of a single particle can interact through spi ...
), between NMR active nuclei. This coupling arises from the interaction of different spin states through the chemical bonds of a molecule and results in the splitting of NMR signals. For a proton, the local magnetic field is slightly different depending on whether an adjacent nucleus points towards or against the spectrometer magnetic field, which gives rise to two signals per proton instead of one. These splitting patterns can be complex or simple and, likewise, can be straightforwardly interpretable or deceptive. This coupling provides detailed insight into the connectivity of atoms in a molecule.
The multiplicity of the splitting is an effect of the spins of the nuclei that are coupled and the number of such nuclei involved in the coupling. Coupling to ''n'' equivalent spin-1/2 nuclei splits the signal into a ''n'' + 1 multiplet with intensity ratios following
Pascal's triangle
In mathematics, Pascal's triangle is an infinite triangular array of the binomial coefficients which play a crucial role in probability theory, combinatorics, and algebra. In much of the Western world, it is named after the French mathematician Bla ...
as described in the table. Coupling to additional spins leads to further splittings of each component of the multiplet, e.g. coupling to two different spin-1/2 nuclei with significantly different coupling constants leads to a ''doublet of doublets'' (abbreviation: dd). Note that coupling between nuclei that are chemically equivalent (that is, have the same chemical shift) has no effect on the NMR spectra, and couplings between nuclei that are distant (usually more than 3 bonds apart for protons in flexible molecules) are usually too small to cause observable splittings. ''Long-range'' couplings over more than three bonds can often be observed in
cyclic and
aromatic
In organic chemistry, aromaticity is a chemical property describing the way in which a conjugated system, conjugated ring of unsaturated bonds, lone pairs, or empty orbitals exhibits a stabilization stronger than would be expected from conjugati ...
compounds, leading to more complex splitting patterns.

For example, in the proton spectrum for ethanol, the CH
3 group is split into a ''triplet'' with an intensity ratio of 1:2:1 by the two neighboring CH
2 protons. Similarly, the CH
2 is split into a ''quartet'' with an intensity ratio of 1:3:3:1 by the three neighboring CH
3 protons. In principle, the two CH
2 protons would also be split again into a ''doublet'' to form a ''doublet of quartets'' by the hydroxyl proton, but intermolecular exchange of the acidic hydroxyl proton often results in a loss of coupling information.
Coupling to any spin-1/2 nuclei such as phosphorus-31 or fluorine-19 works in this fashion (although the magnitudes of the coupling constants may be very different). But the splitting patterns differ from those described above for nuclei with spin greater than 1/2 because the
spin quantum number
In physics and chemistry, the spin quantum number is a quantum number (designated ) that describes the intrinsic angular momentum (or spin angular momentum, or simply ''spin'') of an electron or other particle. It has the same value for all ...
has more than two possible values. For instance, coupling to deuterium (a spin-1 nucleus) splits the signal into a ''1:1:1 triplet'' because the spin 1 has three spin states. Similarly, a spin-3/2 nucleus such as
35Cl splits a signal into a ''1:1:1:1 quartet'' and so on.
Coupling combined with the chemical shift (and the integration for protons) tells us not only about the chemical environment of the nuclei, but also the number of ''neighboring'' NMR active nuclei within the molecule. In more complex spectra with multiple peaks at similar chemical shifts or in spectra of nuclei other than hydrogen, coupling is often the only way to distinguish different nuclei.
The magnitude of the coupling (the coupling constant ''J'') is an effect of how strongly the nuclei are coupled to each other. For simple cases, this is an effect of the bonding distance between the nuclei, the magnetic moment of the nuclei, and the dihedral angle between them.
Second-order (or strong) coupling

The above description assumes that the coupling constant is small in comparison with the difference in NMR frequencies between the inequivalent spins. If the shift separation decreases (or the coupling strength increases), the multiplet intensity patterns are first distorted, and then become more complex and less easily analyzed (especially if more than two spins are involved). Intensification of some peaks in a multiplet is achieved at the expense of the remainder, which sometimes almost disappear in the background noise, although the integrated area under the peaks remains constant.
In most high-field NMR, however, the distortions are usually modest, and the characteristic distortions (''roofing'') can in fact help to identify related peaks.
Some of these patterns can be analyzed with the
method
Method (, methodos, from μετά/meta "in pursuit or quest of" + ὁδός/hodos "a method, system; a way or manner" of doing, saying, etc.), literally means a pursuit of knowledge, investigation, mode of prosecuting such inquiry, or system. In re ...
published by
John Pople
Sir John Anthony Pople (31 October 1925 – 15 March 2004) was a British theoretical chemist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Walter Kohn in 1998 for his development of computational methods in quantum chemistry.
Ear ...
, though it has limited scope.
Second-order effects decrease as the frequency difference between multiplets increases, so that high-field (i.e. high-frequency) NMR spectra display less distortion than lower-frequency spectra. Early spectra at 60 MHz were more prone to distortion than spectra from later machines typically operating at frequencies at 200 MHz or above.
Furthermore, as in the figure to the right, J-coupling can be used to identify ortho-meta-para substitution of a ring. Ortho coupling is the strongest at 15 Hz, Meta follows with an average of 2 Hz, and finally para coupling is usually insignificant for studies.
Magnetic inequivalence
More subtle effects can occur if chemically equivalent spins (i.e., nuclei related by symmetry and so having the same NMR frequency) have different coupling relationships to external spins. Spins that are chemically equivalent but are not indistinguishable (based on their coupling relationships) are termed magnetically inequivalent. For example, the 4 H sites of 1,2-dichlorobenzene divide into two chemically equivalent pairs by symmetry, but an individual member of one of the pairs has different couplings to the spins making up the other pair.
Magnetic inequivalence can lead to highly complex spectra, which can only be analyzed by computational modeling. Such effects are more common in NMR spectra of aromatic and other non-flexible systems, while conformational averaging about C−C bonds in flexible molecules tends to equalize the couplings between protons on adjacent carbons, reducing problems with magnetic inequivalence.
Correlation spectroscopy
Correlation spectroscopy
In statistics, correlation or dependence is any statistical relationship, whether causal or not, between two random variables or bivariate data. Although in the broadest sense, "correlation" may indicate any type of association, in statistics ...
is one of several types of two-dimensional nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy or
2D-NMR. This type of NMR experiment is best known by its
acronym
An acronym is a type of abbreviation consisting of a phrase whose only pronounced elements are the initial letters or initial sounds of words inside that phrase. Acronyms are often spelled with the initial Letter (alphabet), letter of each wor ...
,
COSY
CoSy, short for Conferencing System, was an early computer conferencing system developed at the University of Guelph.
The CoS software grew out of an interest in group computer mediated communication systems in 1981 by Dick Mason and John Black. ...
. Other types of two-dimensional NMR include J-spectroscopy, exchange spectroscopy (EXSY),
Nuclear Overhauser effect
The nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) is the transfer of spin polarization, nuclear spin polarization from one population of Spin (physics), spin-active nuclei (e.g. 1H, 13C, 15N etc.) to another via Relaxation (NMR), cross-relaxation. A phenomenolog ...
spectroscopy (NOESY), total correlation spectroscopy (TOCSY), and heteronuclear correlation experiments, such as
HSQC
The heteronuclear single quantum coherence or heteronuclear single quantum correlation experiment, normally abbreviated as HSQC, is used frequently in NMR spectroscopy of organic molecules and is of particular significance in the field of protein N ...
,
HMQC, and
HMBC. In correlation spectroscopy, emission is centered on the peak of an individual nucleus; if its magnetic field is correlated with another nucleus by through-bond (COSY, HSQC, etc.) or through-space (NOE) coupling, a response can also be detected on the frequency of the correlated nucleus. Two-dimensional NMR spectra provide more information about a molecule than one-dimensional NMR spectra and are especially useful in determining the structure of a
molecule
A molecule is a group of two or more atoms that are held together by Force, attractive forces known as chemical bonds; depending on context, the term may or may not include ions that satisfy this criterion. In quantum physics, organic chemi ...
, particularly for molecules that are too complicated to work with using one-dimensional NMR. The first two-dimensional experiment, COSY, was proposed by Jean Jeener, a professor at Université Libre de Bruxelles, in 1971. This experiment was later implemented by Walter P. Aue, Enrico Bartholdi and
Richard R. Ernst, who published their work in 1976.
Solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance
A variety of physical circumstances do not allow molecules to be studied in solution, and at the same time not by other spectroscopic techniques to an atomic level, either. In solid-phase media, such as crystals, microcrystalline powders, gels, anisotropic solutions, etc., it is in particular the dipolar coupling and chemical shift anisotropy that become dominant to the behaviour of the nuclear spin systems. In conventional solution-state NMR spectroscopy, these additional interactions would lead to a significant broadening of spectral lines. A variety of techniques allows establishing high-resolution conditions, that can, at least for
13C spectra, be comparable to solution-state NMR spectra.
Two important concepts for high-resolution solid-state NMR spectroscopy are the limitation of possible molecular orientation by sample orientation, and the reduction of anisotropic nuclear magnetic interactions by sample spinning. Of the latter approach, fast spinning around the
magic angle
The magic angle is a precisely defined angle, the value of which is approximately 54.7356°. The magic angle is a root of a second-order Legendre polynomial, , and so any interaction which depends on this second-order Legendre polynomial vanishes ...
is a very prominent method, when the system comprises spin-1/2 nuclei. Spinning rates of about 20 kHz are used, which demands special equipment. A number of intermediate techniques, with samples of partial alignment or reduced mobility, is currently being used in NMR spectroscopy.
Applications in which solid-state NMR effects occur are often related to structure investigations on membrane proteins, protein fibrils or all kinds of polymers, and chemical analysis in inorganic chemistry, but also include "exotic" applications like the plant leaves and fuel cells. For example, Rahmani et al. studied the effect of pressure and temperature on the bicellar structures' self-assembly using deuterium NMR spectroscopy. Solid-state NMR is useful also for metal structure understanding in case of X-ray amorphous metal samples (like nano-size refractory metal
99Tc) . Recent studies have combined solid-state NMR with molecular dynamics simulations to resolve nanosecond-to-millisecond-scale motions in hydrated materials like amorphous calcium carbonate.
Biomolecular NMR spectroscopy
Proteins
Much of the innovation within NMR spectroscopy has been within the field of
protein NMR
Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy of proteins (usually abbreviated protein NMR) is a field of structural biology in which NMR spectroscopy is used to obtain information about the structure and dynamics of proteins, and also nucleic acids, and ...
spectroscopy, an important technique in
structural biology
Structural biology deals with structural analysis of living material (formed, composed of, and/or maintained and refined by living cells) at every level of organization.
Early structural biologists throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries we ...
. A common goal of these investigations is to obtain high resolution 3-dimensional structures of the protein, similar to what can be achieved by
X-ray crystallography
X-ray crystallography is the experimental science of determining the atomic and molecular structure of a crystal, in which the crystalline structure causes a beam of incident X-rays to Diffraction, diffract in specific directions. By measuring th ...
. In contrast to X-ray crystallography, NMR spectroscopy is usually limited to proteins smaller than 35
kDa
The dalton or unified atomic mass unit (symbols: Da or u, respectively) is a unit of mass defined as of the mass of an unbound neutral atom of carbon-12 in its nuclear and electronic ground state and at rest. It is a non-SI unit accepted f ...
, although larger structures have been solved. NMR spectroscopy is often the only way to obtain high resolution information on partially or wholly
intrinsically unstructured proteins
In molecular biology, an intrinsically disordered protein (IDP) is a protein that lacks a fixed or ordered three-dimensional structure, typically in the absence of its macromolecular interaction partners, such as other proteins or RNA. IDPs ran ...
. It is now a common tool for the determination of
Conformation Activity Relationship
Conformation generally means structural arrangement and may refer to:
* Conformational isomerism, a form of stereoisomerism in chemistry
** Carbohydrate conformation
** Cyclohexane conformation
** Protein conformation
** Conformation activity rel ...
s where the structure before and after interaction with, for example, a drug candidate is compared to its known biochemical activity. Proteins are
orders of magnitude
In a ratio scale based on powers of ten, the order of magnitude is a measure of the nearness of two figures. Two numbers are "within an order of magnitude" of each other if their ratio is between 1/10 and 10. In other words, the two numbers are wi ...
larger than the small organic molecules discussed earlier in this article, but the basic NMR techniques and some NMR theory also applies. Because of the much higher number of atoms present in a protein molecule in comparison with a small organic compound, the basic 1D spectra become crowded with overlapping signals to an extent where direct spectral analysis becomes untenable. Therefore, multidimensional (2, 3 or 4D) experiments have been devised to deal with this problem. To facilitate these experiments, it is desirable to
isotopically label the protein with
13C and
15N because the predominant naturally occurring isotope
12C is not NMR-active and the nuclear quadrupole moment of the predominant naturally occurring
14N isotope prevents high resolution information from being obtained from this nitrogen isotope. The most important method used for structure determination of proteins utilizes
NOE experiments to measure distances between atoms within the molecule. Subsequently, the distances obtained are used to generate a 3D structure of the molecule by solving a
distance geometry Distance geometry is the branch of mathematics concerned with characterizing and studying sets of points based ''only'' on given values of the distances between pairs of points. More abstractly, it is the study of semimetric spaces and the isom ...
problem. NMR can also be used to obtain information on the dynamics and conformational flexibility of different regions of a protein.
Nucleic acids
Nucleic acid NMR is the use of NMR spectroscopy to obtain information about the structure and dynamics of poly
nucleic acid
Nucleic acids are large biomolecules that are crucial in all cells and viruses. They are composed of nucleotides, which are the monomer components: a pentose, 5-carbon sugar, a phosphate group and a nitrogenous base. The two main classes of nuclei ...
s, such as
DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid (; DNA) is a polymer composed of two polynucleotide chains that coil around each other to form a double helix. The polymer carries genetic instructions for the development, functioning, growth and reproduction of al ...
or
RNA
Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a polymeric molecule that is essential for most biological functions, either by performing the function itself (non-coding RNA) or by forming a template for the production of proteins (messenger RNA). RNA and deoxyrib ...
. , nearly half of all known RNA structures had been determined by NMR spectroscopy.
Nucleic acid and protein NMR spectroscopy are similar but differences exist. Nucleic acids have a smaller percentage of hydrogen atoms, which are the atoms usually observed in NMR spectroscopy, and because
nucleic acid double helices are stiff and roughly linear, they do not fold back on themselves to give "long-range" correlations.
The types of NMR usually done with nucleic acids are
1H or proton NMR,
13C NMR,
15N NMR, and
31P NMR.
Two-dimensional NMR
Two-Dimensional Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (2D NMR) is an advanced spectroscopic technique that builds upon the capabilities of one-dimensional (1D) NMR by incorporating an additional frequency dimension. This extension allows for a more compre ...
methods are almost always used, such as correlation spectroscopy (COSY) and total coherence transfer spectroscopy (TOCSY) to detect through-bond nuclear couplings, and
nuclear Overhauser effect
The nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) is the transfer of spin polarization, nuclear spin polarization from one population of Spin (physics), spin-active nuclei (e.g. 1H, 13C, 15N etc.) to another via Relaxation (NMR), cross-relaxation. A phenomenolog ...
spectroscopy (NOESY) to detect couplings between nuclei that are close to each other in space.
Parameters taken from the spectrum, mainly NOESY cross-peaks and
coupling constants, can be used to determine local structural features such as
glycosidic bond
A glycosidic bond or glycosidic linkage is a type of ether bond that joins a carbohydrate (sugar) molecule to another group, which may or may not be another carbohydrate.
A glycosidic bond is formed between the hemiacetal or hemiketal group o ...
angles,
dihedral angles (using the
Karplus equation
The Karplus equation, named after Martin Karplus, describes the correlation between 3J-coupling constants and dihedral angle, dihedral torsion angles in nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy:
:J(\phi) = A \cos\,2\phi + B \cos\,\phi + C
where ' ...
), and sugar pucker conformations. For large-scale structure, these local parameters must be supplemented with other structural assumptions or models, because errors add up as the double helix is traversed, and unlike with proteins, the double helix does not have a compact interior and does not fold back upon itself. NMR is also useful for investigating nonstandard geometries such as
bent helices, non-Watson–Crick basepairing, and
coaxial stacking
Nucleic acid tertiary structure is the three-dimensional shape of a nucleic acid polymer. RNA and DNA molecules are capable of diverse functions ranging from molecular recognition to catalysis. Such functions require a precise three-dimensional ...
. It has been especially useful in probing the structure of natural RNA oligonucleotides, which tend to adopt complex conformations such as
stem-loop
Stem-loops are nucleic acid Biomolecular structure, secondary structural elements which form via intramolecular base pairing in single-stranded DNA or RNA. They are also referred to as hairpins or hairpin loops. A stem-loop occurs when two regi ...
s and
pseudoknot
__NOTOC__
A pseudoknot is a nucleic acid secondary structure containing at least two stem-loop structures in which half of one stem is intercalated between the two halves of another stem. The pseudoknot was first recognized in the turnip yellow ...
s. NMR is also useful for probing the binding of
nucleic acid molecules to other molecules, such as proteins or drugs, by seeing which resonances are shifted upon binding of the other molecule.
Carbohydrates
Carbohydrate NMR spectroscopy addresses questions on the structure and conformation of
carbohydrate
A carbohydrate () is a biomolecule composed of carbon (C), hydrogen (H), and oxygen (O) atoms. The typical hydrogen-to-oxygen atomic ratio is 2:1, analogous to that of water, and is represented by the empirical formula (where ''m'' and ''n'' ...
s. The analysis of carbohydrates by 1H NMR is challenging due to the limited variation in functional groups, which leads to 1H resonances concentrated in narrow bands of the NMR spectrum. In other words, there is poor spectral dispersion. The anomeric proton resonances are segregated from the others due to fact that the anomeric carbons bear two oxygen atoms. For smaller carbohydrates, the dispersion of the anomeric proton resonances facilitates the use of 1D TOCSY experiments to investigate the entire spin systems of individual carbohydrate residues.
Drug discovery
Knowledge of energy minima and rotational energy barriers of small molecules in solution can be found using NMR, e.g. looking at free ligand conformational preferences and conformational dynamics, respectively. This can be used to guide drug design hypotheses, since experimental and calculated values are comparable. For example, AstraZeneca uses NMR for its oncology research & development.
High-pressure NMR spectroscopy
One of the first scientific works devoted to the use of pressure as a variable parameter in NMR experiments was the work of J. Jonas published in the journal Annual Review of Biophysics in 1994. The use of high pressures in NMR spectroscopy was primarily driven by the desire to study biochemical systems, where the use of high pressure allows controlled changes in intermolecular interactions without significant perturbations.
Of course, attempts have been made to solve scientific problems using high-pressure NMR spectroscopy. However, most of them were difficult to reproduce due to the problem of equipment for creating and maintaining high pressure. In the most common types of NMR cells for realization of high-pressure NMR experiments are given.
High-pressure NMR spectroscopy has been widely used for a variety of applications, mainly related to the characterization of the structure of protein molecules. However, in recent years, software and design solutions have been proposed to characterize the chemical and spatial structures of small molecules in a supercritical fluid environment, using state parameters as a driving force for such changes.
See also
*
Related methods of
nuclear spectroscopy
Nuclear spectroscopy is a superordinate concept of methods that uses properties of a Nuclide, nucleus to probe material properties. By Radiation emission, emission or Absorption (electromagnetic radiation), absorption of radiation from the nucleus ...
:
*
Mössbauer effect
The Mössbauer effect, or recoilless nuclear resonance fluorescence, is a physical phenomenon discovered by Rudolf Mössbauer in 1958. It involves the resonant and recoil-free emission and absorption of gamma radiation by atomic nuclei bound in a ...
*
Muon spin spectroscopy
Muon spin spectroscopy, also known as μSR, is an experimental technique based on the implantation of spin polarization, spin-polarized muons in matter and on the detection of the influence of the atomic, molecular or crystalline surroundings on t ...
*
Perturbed angular correlation
The perturbed γ-γ angular correlation, PAC for short or PAC-Spectroscopy, is a method of nuclear solid-state physics with which magnetic field, magnetic and electric fields in crystal structures can be measured. In doing so, electrical field gra ...
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
External links
*
The Basics of NMR- A non-technical overview of NMR theory, equipment, and techniques by Dr. Joseph Hornak, Professor of Chemistry at RIT
GAMMA and PyGAMMA Libraries- GAMMA is an open source C++ library written for the simulation of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy experiments. PyGAMMA is a Python wrapper around GAMMA.
relaxSoftware for the analysis of NMR dynamics
Vespa- VeSPA (Versatile Simulation, Pulses and Analysis) is a free software suite composed of three Python applications. These GUI based tools are for magnetic resonance (MR) spectral simulation, RF pulse design, and spectral processing and analysis of MR data.
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