Wednesday, October 12, 2016

Why can't we have an NMR in a plane?

Credit: Wikimedia
Via the chemistry Reddit, is that really a mass spec in a NASA plane? (Looks like it is possible, and here's a similar picture?)

I get the sense that no one's mounted a NMR in a plane or a boat or a car. Too bad.

UPDATE: Thanks to bad wolf, I see that underground NMR for oil wells is real. Also, check out this company that actually sells NMRs to analyze groundwater. Of all the places where I expected to find NMR, underground was not one of them.

UPDATE 2: In the comments, examples of NMR in cars and proposals for NMR in space! 
Posted by at
Labels:

17 comments:

  1. milkshakeOctober 12, 2016 at 8:30 AM

    maybe they can have the sample spinner connected by belt transmission to the turboprop engine, 20Hz = 1200 rpm (I am so tired of the hisss!)

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 10:54 AM

    There are permanent-magnet-based benchtop instruments that should be operable on a plane or a ship, but I doubt that NMR is sensitive enough for atmospheric analysis at ANY magnetic field, let alone with a magnet that tolerates vibration and gross orientation changes and is light enough to get off the ground.

    ReplyDelete
  3. bad wolfOctober 12, 2016 at 11:30 AM

    When i worked at an oil company i learned geologists have NMRs that are mounted at the end of bores and lowered into drill holes. They are (or were) only ~2MHz but the T1 measurements told them useful info, as i recall.

    Putting the MS directly on the plane makes as much sense as the "go up, collect a sample of atmosphere and bring it back to earth to analyze" that the atmospheric chem groups do, or did.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 1:10 PM

    First line from a 24-year old abstract "Using a novel aircraft-borne automatic mass spectrometer, the odd-nitrogen gases NO, NO2, HNO2 and HNO3 were for the first time measured in a young exhaust-trail of a jetliner at cruise-altitude." Geophysical Review Letters, Volume 19, Issue 24, 24 December 1992, Pages 2421–2424 .

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 4:29 PM

    In 2012 the Overland High School HUNCH team from Aurora, CO, used the Thermo Scientific™ picoSpin™ 45 NMR spectrometer to conduct the world’s first nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiments in a moving automobile, in an in-flight aircraft, and in zero-gravity.
    http://picospin.com/blog/nasa-hunch-extreme-science-zero-gravity-flight-program-and-thermo-fisher-scientific-and-ongoing-relationship-to-inspire-the-next-generation-of-scientists/

    ReplyDelete
  6. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 4:31 PM

    Astronauts may soon have a portable MRI machine to keep an eye on their muscles and bones during a spell on the International Space Station. The custom-built, lightweight MRI should be ready to fly by 2016.
    https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26385-mini-mri-to-check-bone-health-on-space-station/

    ReplyDelete
  7. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 4:36 PM

    Future Missions to Titan - Keck Institute for Space Studies
    see page 23 http://kiss.caltech.edu/study/titan/report.pdf

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ChemjobberOctober 12, 2016 at 4:42 PM

      NMR on Titan - I bow to your excellent Googling skills!

      Delete
    2. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 5:09 PM

      Not quite Google, just following the field

      here is even better yet:
      http://investor.northropgrumman.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=112386&p=irol-newsArticle_print&ID=1937646

      apparently this NMR is to be mounted on satellites, rocket launchers & missiles and likes

      here is more about NMR gyroscopes
      https://arxiv.org/pdf/1604.03982.pdf (see Fig 6 from Northrop Grumman)

      cheers,

      https://twitter.com/nmr900

      Delete
    3. ChemjobberOctober 12, 2016 at 5:32 PM

      Thank you for adding your expertise on this!

      Delete
  8. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 5:31 PM

    Here I found the last one which I came across awhile ago I wanted to show

    Miniature Force-Detected NMR Spectrometer for In-Situ Chemical and
    Mineral Characterization
    http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/LPSC99/pdf/1453.pdf

    pretty cool! also for NASA and deep-space

    All the best

    https://twitter.com/nmr900

    ReplyDelete
  9. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 6:39 PM

    There is also the NMR-mouse and other single-sided NMR instruments:
    http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0730725X98000691
    https://www.bruker.com/products/mr/td-nmr/minispec-profiler/single-sided-nmr/overview.html

    They may not give you your typical 1H or 13C spectrum, but you can do relaxation measurements to get an idea of sample quality. The lecture I saw on the NMR-Mouse suggested applications in tire manufacturing - using relaxation measurements as a quality check to ensure rubber homogeneity.

    ReplyDelete
  10. qvxbOctober 12, 2016 at 9:26 PM

    Wait until Hollywood releases the film NMRs on a Plane.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousOctober 13, 2016 at 11:26 AM

      You have to watch out for those NMR bites...

      Delete
  11. AnonymousOctober 12, 2016 at 10:40 PM

    NOAA also puts GCs on aircraft: http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/hats/airborne/

    ReplyDelete
  12. AnonymousOctober 13, 2016 at 6:46 AM

    Even this excellent candidate has been cancelled: https://ideas.lego.com/projects/91495

    ReplyDelete
  13. BrismartinOctober 15, 2016 at 7:20 PM

    Saw a mass spec on board a Russian marine natural products research vessel in Sydney in the 90s. The had hplc, columns out the wazoo, mass spec, uv, ir, but no NMR. Oh and a complete mouse animal house on the lowest deck

    ReplyDelete

looks like Blogger doesn't work with anonymous comments from Chrome browsers at the moment - works in Microsoft Edge, or from Chrome with a Blogger account - sorry! CJ 3/21/20

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)