Nuclear Magnetic Resonance

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance

The measurement of nuclear and electron magnetic resonance on bulk materials was made possible by Felix Bloch and Edward Purcell and in 1952 they shared the Nobel Prize in Physics for their work. Until then, magnetic resonance was a measurable phenomena in which atoms were shot through a magnet as a beam. This was the work of Rabi. Therefore, the Nobel Prize quality in Bloch and Purcell's work was not in the theory of magnetic resonance itself, but in the development of instruments which would measure this phenomena in bulk material such as liquids and solids. These two laboratories were uniquely suited for this work. Bloch was a great quantum mechanic and is credited with much quality work in the quantum mechanics of solids. Purcell is an electricity and magnetism physicist who worked on projects like radar during the war. His experience in radiofrequency electronics aided in the development of his NMR instrument. Bloch's firm grasp of quantum mechanics allowed him to look at the problem of magnetic resonance classically, while Purcell's classical background forced him to look at NMR with a quantum mechanic approach and develop a spectrometer much like the optical spectrometers.
There is a quantum mechanical property of electrons and some nuclei called spin. In the absence of an externally applied magnetic field, this property is not observable. However, even in optical experiments, this property can be observed when a magnetic field is applied. ...

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance

Login

Join