Project Information AT A GLANCE
Project Title: Gyrotron-DNP NMR: Gyrotron-based Dynamic Nuclear Polarization for Nuclear Magnetic Resonance
Project Objective: A gyrotron designed especially for magnetic resonance generates a 260GHz signal that is guided by a corrugated waveguide built following an innovative technology (Swissto12 S.A.). A resonator is designed to optimize irradiation and signal detection. Operation at the second harmonic of the gyrotron is also in the plan.
DNP-NMR set up in Ansermet’s lab: The Gyrotron (on the right of the picture) is connected to the NMR spectrometer with corrugated waveguides made in titanium developed by SWISSto12. In the loop the quasi-optical path used to fully control the high frequency signal used for the DNP.
Fruitful collaboration or A MegaWatt technology spin-off The very large magnetic fields used nowadays bring a major challenge to DNP – high frequencies. “The bigger the field the bigger the signal but once you get way up in field, the frequency of the electrons is crazy high, 100s of GHz,” says Professor Ansermet. A computer operates at just a few GHz so managing frequencies two orders of magnitude higher is far from trivial. At this point Professor Ansermet and his colleague Professor Bodenhausen, a chemist who develops NMR strategies to investigate biomolecules, sought the expertise of some physicists, who heat up ionised gases – plasmas. The plasma physicists use are so-called gyrotrons, which are similar to microwave ovens but produce waves at very high frequencies and power. As Professor Ansermet explains,
the successful. collaboration was “The most very spectacular
application of such gyrotron-based DNP NMR spectrometer is the demonstration by Professor Emsley and his group, in collaboration with Professor Bodenhausen and his Lausanne group, showing with a Bruker prototype that surface NMR is possible, with a 50-fold increase in sensitivity thanks to DNP.” As it happens, DNP was never fully
forgotten among the nuclear physics community. Physicists studying nuclear structure needed targets with highly
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polarised nuclei. A group that kept on developing the technique is located at the Paul Scherrer Institute, Willigen, under the direction of Dr van den Brandt. Professor Ansermet and his colleagues using DNP have very fruitful collaborations with this group. “They have been steadily improving DNP techniques since for ever. So we, as NMR people, are happy to turn to them and they are happy to turn to us because we have new applications and new tricks!” he adds. Professor Ansermet’s activities in DNP
have forced him to move towards much more complex equipment than what is used for spintronics research. Future breakthroughs will likely come from solving ever greater hardware challenges. These efforts to pass the new electronics hurdles have already spawned a successful start-up company SWISSto12 S.A., which develops equipment that can transmit the very high frequency signals from the gyrotron right down to the sample in the NMR spectrometer. “It’s a beautiful example of how fundamental research — what people call ‘crazy ideas’ — drives people to solve technical problems that create jobs and economic activity.” Thirty years on from Professor Ansermet’s debut in the field and successful research activity seems to continue
momentum. ★ insatiably gaining 61
Project Duration and Timing: On-going since 2008. The gyrotron commissioning and characterization took place in 2012, its installation in an NMR lab is due in 2013. DNP-NMR will be carried out henceforth.
Project Funding: Swiss National Science Foundation, EPFL, over 2Mio external funding
Project Partners: • CRPP, Centre National de Physique des Plasmas, EPFL,
• Laboratory for Biomolecular Magnetic Resonance, EPFL,
• CIBM, Centre d’Imagerie BioMédicale, EPFL,
• Swissto12 S.A., Parc Scientifique, Lausanne
Main Contact:
Jean-Philippe Ansermet A 1981 graduate of EPFL, Ansermet moved to Urbana (Illinois) where he developed for 7 years with Prof. Slichter NMR of surfaces. He then joined the materials research of Ciba-Geigy and became professor at EPFL in 1992. Exploring various aspects of spintronics leads him back to magnetic resonance.
Contact: Tel: + 41 21 693 3339 Email:
jean-philippe.ansermet@
epfl.ch Web:
http://lpmn.epfl.ch
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