NMR spectroscopy is a powerful technique to elucidate structural information from molecules. There are many different NMR experiments which can be recorded, each providing different information about a molecule. You will learn about NMR spectroscopy from many lecture courses during the degree programme and you will get to grips with interpreting your own spectra through the lab courses.

There are a number of different ways that samples can be analysed using NMR spectroscopy, however for teaching purposes, only solution phase NMR spectroscopy is used routinely. This means that any samples need to be prepared as a solution in a non-protic (or deuterated) solvent, usually chloroform-d (CDCl₃) or water-d2 (D₂O), although other solvents may occasionally be used. A deuterated solvent is a solvent where all the ¹H hydrogen atoms in the solvent molecules have been replaced with ²H hydrogen (known as deuterium, D). These solvents are much more expensive than their protic counterparts and should be used sparingly. The deuteration reduces the signals that would be caused by the solvent in the NMR as deuterium is invisible in proton NMR. The deuteration of solvents is never 100%, so a small peak will be seen in proton NMR for the solvent.