Chemical Education Today
Book & Media Reviews
150 and More Basic NMR Experiments: A Practical Course, 2nd Edition by S. Braun, H.-O. Kalinowski, and S. Berger Wiley–VCH: Weinheim, 1998. 520 pp. ISBN 3-527-29512-7. $67.95. reviewed by Nancy S. Mills
In under 600 pages, the authors introduce the reader to more than 150 NMR experiments and give some sense of the depth possible for each experiment. While the book is titled Basic NMR Experiments, most readers would consider these experiments as some of the most sophisticated a chemist who is not an NMR expert would consider doing. With these comments in mind, let me speak to the strengths and potential uses of the book. This book is not for the novice NMR spectroscopist who has never run anything but a “normal” proton spectrum. Although it starts with a section on shimming the magnets and on routine tests like sensitivity, the detail available on more sophisticated multipulse sequences or 2-D spectroscopy is not sufficient for a novice to run these sequences with comfort. However, for a person like me who has run some simple 2-D sequences like COSY or HETCOR and who has some sense
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Jeffrey Kovac University of Tennessee Knoxville, TN 37996-1600
of the power of other sequences, the book is great. It collects in one place all the common pulse sequences, including those using pulsed field gradients. I feel as though most of the instruction I received when our high-field NMR was installed is contained in this book, making it a much more useful resource than my scribbled notes. In addition to 2-D experiments, the book includes brief descriptions of decoupling techniques, dynamic NMR spectroscopy, experiments with chiral shift reagents, and even 3-D experiments and solid state NMR spectroscopy. Of particular value is the identification in each experiment of other experiments giving basically the same information. When used along with the indication of the time required for each experiment, it is possible to decide which is the most efficient experiment to elicit certain types of information. In addition, the discussion of each experiment illuminates the experiment’s “warts”, such as poor signal-tonoise ratio or the need for long relaxation times. I think this is a great book, when considered as an encyclopedia of the techniques a modern NMR spectroscopist might need. While new pulse sequences continue to be developed, this book will be a useful resource for the next five years, at least. Nancy Mills is in the Department of Chemistry, Trinity University, San Antonio, TX 78212-7200;
[email protected].
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 77 No. 7 July 2000 • Journal of Chemical Education
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