Two-dimensional on- and off-resonance nutation FFT/MEM NQR spectroscopy

Abstract

The new two-dimensional nuclear quadrupole resonance experiments based on the principle of nutation spectroscopy, which can be used to determine the asymmetry parameter, and thus the full quadrupolar tensor of spin-3/2 nuclei at zero applied magnetic field are discussed. The problems of reconstructing 2D-nutation NQR spectra using conventional methods and the advantages of using implementation of the maximum entropy method (MEM) are analyzed. Use of the MEM in 2D-NQR spectroscopy can lead to sensitivity improvement, reduction of instrumental artifacts and truncation errors, shortened data acquisition times and automatic suppression of noise, while at the same time increasing the resolution. The possibilities of off-resonance irradiation in nutation experiments are demonstrated experimentally and theoretically. It is shown that the off-resonance nutation spectroscopy is a useful extension of the conventional on-resonance experiments thus facilitating the determination of asymmetry parameters in multiple spectrum. The methods have been successfully demonstrated for the35Cl on-and off-resonance 2D-nutation spectra in polycrystalline 2,4,6-trichloro-1,3,5-triazine.