Brief Summary of research: 

In our group we study molecules on surfaces using solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) enhanced with dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP). The combination of DNP with NMR allows us to explore samples that have not yet been studied with NMR, including materials that are challenging for the current state of the art of NMR.

NMR is a non-destructive, atomic, site-specific technique that can give quantitative, angstrom-scale structural information in gas, liquid, and solid-phase (both crystalline and amorphous) samples. It is sensitive to the local chemical environment and to molecular motions, which makes it well suited to studying the behavior of molecules on surfaces, bulk material, and how they interact. However, in many cases the NMR sensitivity is quite low. We overcome this by increasing the NMR signal using DNP. In DNP, we irradiate with microwave irradiation on paramagnetic centers (unpaired electrons), and the interaction between the electron spins and the nuclear spins results in enhancement of the NMR signal.
 

Specific research topics related to Nanoscience and Nanotechnology: 

As part of this work, we develop DNP-NMR techniques and novel DNP enhancement agents. We are developing nano-scale materials that can be used for DNP enhancement. The materials we prepare are both inorganic, or organic polymer based, nanostructures and can contain paramagnetic centers that are either stable organic radicals or metal ions embedded into the material. We have been characterizing the materials using the Nano-Center facilities, such as SEM, TEM, Raman spectroscopy and XPS. Together with DNP-NMR, these techniques give us a better understanding of the structure of the materials, local order, porosity and more.

This work is not only important for the DNP-NMR community, but also for the nano-community. We are developing new synthesis methods for new types of materials, which may be used in a wide range of applications, such as for energy storage, for gas filtrations and more.