New Application of Proton Nuclear Spin Relaxation Unraveling the Intermolecular Structural Features of Low-Molecular-Weight Organogel Fibers

Abstract

Proton nuclear spin relaxation has been for the first time extensively used for a structural and dynamical study of low-molecular-weight organogels. The gelator in the present study is a modified phenylalanine amino acid bearing a naphthalimide moiety. From T(1) (spin-lattice relaxation time in the laboratory frame) and T(1ρ) (spin-lattice relaxation time in the rotating frame) measurements, it is shown that the visible gelator NMR spectrum below the liquid-gel transition temperature corresponds to a so-called isotropic compartment, where gelator molecules behave as in a liquid phase but exchange rapidly with the molecules constituting the gel structure. This feature allows one to derive, from accessible parameters, information about the gel itself. Nuclear Overhauser effect spectroscopy (NOESY) experiments have been exploited in view of determining not only cross-relaxation rates but also specific longitudinal rates. The whole set of relaxation parameters (at 25 °C) leads to a correlation time of 5 ns for gelator molecules within the gel structure and 150 ps for gelator molecules in the isotropic phase. This confirms, on one hand, the flexibility of the organogel fibers and, on the other hand, the likely presence of clusters in the isotropic phase. Concerning cross-relaxation rates, a thorough theoretical investigation in multispin systems of direct and relayed correlations in a NOESY spectrum allows one to make conclusions about contacts (around 2-3 Å) not only between naphtalimide moieties of different gelator molecules but also between the phenyl ring and the naphtalimide moiety again of different gelator molecules. As a result, not only is the head-to-tail structure of amino acid columns confirmed but also the entangling of nearby columns by the naphthalimide moieties is demonstrated.