Nuclear Magnetic Resonance With No Magnets

Spectroscopy with conventional nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) requires large, expensive, superconducting magnets cooled by liquid helium, like the one in the background. The Pines and Budker groups have demonstrated NMR spectroscopy with a device only a few centimeters high, using no magnets at all (foreground). A chemical sample in the test tube (green) is polarized by introducing hydrogen gas in the parahydrogen form. The sample’s NMR is measured with an opticalatomic magnetometer, at center; laser beams crossing at right angles pump and probe the atoms in the microfabricated vapor cell. (Click on image for best resolution.) Berkeley Lab News Center http://newscenter.lbl.gov -