Funds are provided to The Center for Advanced Materials (CAM) to acquire a 500-MHz NMR instrument for research programs of more than 50 faculty, staff and graduate students within the University. The availability of this instrument will allow the Center to expand and develop substantial interdisciplinary research in materials. Currently, no capability for 500-MHz studies exists at the institution. Research initiatives just underway include studies of: 1)synthetic analogues of natural poly(beta- hydroxyalkanoates); 2) stereochemical and repeat unit sequence analysis; 3) characterization of rigid-rod like site-selective Chitosan derivatives; 4) characterization of biodegradation products; 5) characterization of fermentation reactions and products; 6) reversible association/gelation of amphiphilic cation-anion polymers; 7)relative strength of intraand intermolecular ionic interactions; 8) well-defined blockgraft- and functional polymers by living cationic polymerization; 9)initiation via haloboration in living cationic polymerization; 10) syntheses and characterization of biotinylated copolymers of thiophene and nonlinear optical chromophore substituted copolymers of thiophene which are precursors for monolayer, photovoltaic and biosensor applications; 11) syntheses and characterization of novel polydiacetylenes for second and third order nonlinear optical applications; 12) syntheses and characterization of guest-host, sol-gel, and interpenetrating polymer network(IPN) systems for NLO applications; 13) NMR studies of polyacetylenes; 14) and studies of chemical shifts, coupling constant, and molecular structures of selenium and tellurium compounds. Funds are provided to The Center for Advanced Materials (CAM) to acquire a 500-MHz NMR instrument for research programs of more than 50 faculty, staff and graduate students within the University. The availability of this instrument will allow the Center to expand and develop substantial interdisciplinary research in m aterials. Currently, no capability for 500-MHz studies exists at the institution. The greater chemical shift dispersion of the high field instrument is advantageous for characterization of materials, particularly polymer stereochemistry, sequencing and biological macromolecules. Such information is extremely valuable for determining mechanisms of polymerization and degradation and macromolecular interactions. In addition, the four-fold gain in sensitivity will permit studies of low sensitivity nuclei and/or dilute spin systems that are currently either inaccessible or accessible only through the preparation of isotopically enriched materials.
