Ultrafast NMR diffusion and relaxation studies

Relaxation and diffusion NMR experiments, called also Laplace NMR experiments, provide detailed information about rotational and translational motion of molecules. Furthermore, they offer chemical resolution complementary to spectra. The resolution and information content of the experiments can be improved by a multidimensional approach. The approach enables one to determine the correlations between the relaxation and diffusion parameters and study chemical or physical exchange. However, the multidimensional approach is slow, as the experiment has to be repeated many times with incremented evolution time. In the ultrafast Laplace NMR method, the various evolution times are encoded into layers of the sample. This enables one to measure multidimensional data in a single scan, reducing the experiment time by one to three orders of magnitude. In addition, the single-scan approach facilitates significantly the use of modern hyperpolarization methods to increase the sensitivity of the experiment by several orders of magnitude. This review describes the principles of ultrafast Laplace NMR and highlights its applications in various disciplines, including those using low-field, mobile, single-sided NMR instruments.