Magnetic Attraction

More than 80 researchers across campus and the state will benefit from the Chemistry Department 's success in securing funding for an interdepartmental Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Facility. A state-of-the-art NMR spectrometer will be purchased, and lab space will be remodeled to house it, with $710,900 from the National Science Foundation, $400,000 from the Murdock Trust, $300,000 from the Research Office, $66,700 from the College of Science, $66,700 from the Department, and $66,700 from the University's Building Use Credit funds.

The upgraded capacity will solidify OSU's standing as the dominant NMR provider in Oregon, with the most sensitive carbon detector magnet in the world. "Organic chemists make compounds. We then need to we figure out what we've made," said Rich Carter, Associate Professor of Chemistry. "That's the simple way to say that on almost any day, we rely on an NMR spectrometer — it's extremely important to our work."

"Nature makes some compounds in very tiny quantities, and our lab makes them in larger amounts so we can test them for bioactivity such as anti-cancer, HIV, and fungal activity," he said. "NMR is the key."

"The instruments we've had contain 300-400 megahertz magnets. They may take a week for a certain experiment, and we share the equipment with a large number of users. For our very high-powered needs, we've had to send compounds out to the company that makes the stronger instruments. It's really slowed us down."

The new spectrometer will be 700 megahertz, and thus capable of much more resolution.

"It's quite complex," said Carter. "For what took a week, it will take only five hours."

That is all good news to over 20 different research groups across Oregon, in 10 OSU departments from Pharmacy to Wood Science; various universities including OHSU and George Fox U.; and three chemical and biotechnology companies.

Carter said, "As soon as NSF came out with its funded proposals list, the companies that manufacture NMRs started contacting me. The bidding is out now. It will take about six months for us to determine details of what we want, and about six months for it to be built.

"It's hard to predict exactly where science will be a year from now, to know exactly what we'll be using this instrument for," said Carter. "One thing certain is that with the increased number of spectrometers, faculty will be better able to integrate NMR into the curriculum for undergraduate and the graduate programs."

The new NMR will be housed with the old ones in Gilbert Addition, awaiting the new LPI/Chemistry building.