Chiral NMR Shift Reagents

Bates College, Lewiston ME

Investigators

Abstract

Professor Thomas Wenzel of Bates College is supported by the Analytical and Surface Chemistry program to continue work on combining macrocyclic hosts with lanthanide shift reagents to obtain chiral information about analytes using Nuclear Magnetic Resonance spectroscopy (NMR). Determination of the unique absolute configurations of certain chemical compounds is extremely important for pharmaceutical and other biochemical industries. While NMR is not inherently sensitive to the handedness of molecules, it can be used in this analytical application in combination with macrocycles that provide environments enabling the exact three dimensional structures to be determined. In this project, undergraduate students receive training in synthesis and NMR methods on an industrially relevant topic.