Mixture Analysis in Viscous Solvents by NMR Spin Diffusion Spectroscopy: ViscY. Application to High- and Low-Polarity Organic Compounds Dissolved in Sulfolane/Water and Sulfolane/DMSO-d6 Blends

Unlocking the Potential of Water-Insoluble Natural Polymers: Isolation, Characterization, and 2D NMR Quantification of cis-1,4-Poly-β-myrcene in Chios Mastic Gum

Natural polymers have garnered attention due to their unique properties, i.e., structural versatility, biocompatibility, and modifiability. Recent efforts focus on sustainable raw materials to develop environmentally friendly processes and products that align with global sustainability goals. Among these, Chios mastic gum, derived from the mastic tree (Pistacia lentiscus var. Chia), is notable for its diverse food, pharmaceutical, and cosmetics applications. One of its key components is cis-1,4-poly-β-myrcene, a natural polyterpene polymer, constituting 20-30% of the resin's composition. Despite its potential, the complex composition of Chios mastic gum poses challenges in extracting, isolating, and quantifying its polymeric content. NMR spectroscopy offers a nondestructive approach and may be instrumental in developing standardized methods for quantifying cis-1,4-poly-β-myrcene in Chios mastic gum. Such methods are vital for understanding the resin's composition and exploring potential applications, particularly in sustainable materials and biomedical fields. This study addresses these challenges by producing a cis-1,4-poly-β-myrcene sample as a standard in quantification procedures. Centrifugal partition chromatography, a support-free liquid-liquid chromatography technique, was employed to purify the polymeric fraction. The polymer was then characterized through size exclusion chromatography and NMR methods, including DOSY and quantitative HSQC experiments, to facilitate an accurate analysis and open the door to further applications of this natural polymer.

NMR methods for the analysis of mixtures

NMR spectroscopy is a powerful approach for the analysis of mixtures. Its usefulness arises in large part from the vast landscape of methods, and corresponding pulse sequences, that have been and are being designed to tackle the specific properties of mixtures of small molecules. This feature article describes a selection of methods that aim to address the complexity, the low concentrations, and the changing nature that mixtures can display. These notably include pure-shift and diffusion NMR methods, hyperpolarisation methods, and fast 2D NMR methods such as ultrafast 2D NMR and non-uniform sampling. Examples or applications are also described, in fields such as reaction monitoring and metabolomics, to illustrate the relevance and limitations of different methods.

Use of Diethanolamine as a Viscous Solvent for Mixture Analysis by Multidimensional Heteronuclear ViscY NMR Experiments

Diethanolamine/DMSO-d₆ as a viscous binary solvent is first reported for the individualization of low-polarity mixture components by multidimensional heteronuclear ViscY NMR experiments under spin diffusion conditions. Solvent viscosity induces the slowing down of molecular tumbling, hence promoting magnetization transfer by dipolar longitudinal cross-relaxation. As a result, all ¹H nuclei resonances within the same molecule may correlate in a 2D nuclear Overhauser effect spectroscopy (NOESY) spectrum, giving access to mixture analysis. We offer a new way to analyze mixtures by considering 3D heteronuclear heteronuclear single-quantum coherence-NOESY (HSQC-NOESY) experiments under viscous conditions. We state the individualization of four low-polarity chemical compounds dissolved in the diethanolamine/DMSO-d₆ solvent blend using homonuclear selective 1D, 2D ¹H-¹H NOESY experiments and heteronuclear 1D, 2D ¹H-¹⁹F heteronuclear Overhauser effect spectroscopy, 2D ¹H-¹⁹F, ¹H-³¹P HSQC-NOESY, and 3D ¹H-¹⁹F-¹H, ¹H-³¹P-¹H HSQC-NOESY experiments by taking profit from spin diffusion.

ViscY NMR experiments in phosphoric acid as a viscous solvent for individualization of small molecules within mixtures by spin diffusion

The analysis of small molecules within complex mixtures is a particularly difficult task when dealing with the study of metabolite mixtures or chemical reaction media. This issue has fostered in recent years an active search for effective and practical solutions. In this context, the ViscY NMR approach has been recently proposed. ViscY collectively designates the NMR experiments that take advantage of spin diffusion in highly viscous solvents or solvent blends for the individualization of the NMR spectra of small molecule mixture components. Two viscous media were prepared from ortho-phosphoric acid (85%) solution by dilution with either D2O or DMSO-d6, thus providing solvent blends with slightly different polarities in which all liquid-state NMR experiments can be carried out easily. Two mixtures, one of four structurally close dipeptides and one of four low-polarity phosphorus-containing compounds, were used for the method assessment, using ViscY experiments such as homonuclear selective 1D and 2D 1H NOESY experiments, heteronuclear 2D 1H-15N/1H-31P HSQC-NOESY and 1H-13C/1H-15N/1H-31P NOAH experiments.

Tailoring the nuclear Overhauser effect for the study of small and medium-sized molecules by solvent viscosity manipulation

The nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) is a consequence of cross-relaxation between nuclear spins mediated by dipolar coupling. Its sensitivity to internuclear distances has made it an increasingly important tool for the determination of through-space atom proximity relationships within molecules of sizes ranging from the smallest systems to large biopolymers. With the support of sophisticated FT-NMR techniques, the NOE plays an essential role in structure elucidation, conformational and dynamic investigations in liquid-state NMR. The efficiency of magnetization transfer by the NOE depends on the molecular rotational correlation time, whose value depends on solution viscosity. The magnitude of the NOE between ¹H nuclei varies from +50% when molecular tumbling is fast to -100% when it is slow, the latter case corresponding to the spin diffusion limit. In an intermediate tumbling regime, the NOE may be vanishingly small. Increasing the viscosity of the solution increases the motional correlation time, and as a result, otherwise unobservable NOEs may be revealed and brought close to the spin diffusion limit. The goal of this review is to report the resolution of structural problems that benefited from the manipulation of the negative NOE by means of viscous solvents, including examples of molecular structure determination, conformation elucidation and mixture analysis (the ViscY method).