Compensating Pulse Imperfections in Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy: A Key to Better Reproducibility and Performance.

The power and versatility of NMR spectroscopy is strongly related to the ability to manipulate NMR interactions by the application of radio-frequency (rf) pulse sequences. Unfortunately, the rf fields seen by the spins differ from the ones programmed by the experimentalist. Pulse transients, i.e., deviations of the amplitude and phase of the rf fields from the desired values, can have a severe impact on the performance of pulse sequences and can lead to inconsistent results. Here, we demonstrate how transient-compensated pulses can greatly improve the efficiency and reproducibility of NMR experiments. The implementation is based on a measurement of the characteristics of the resonance circuit and does not rely on an experimental optimization of the NMR signal. We show how the pulse sequence has to be modified to use it with transient-compensated pulses. The efficiency and reproducibility of the transient-compensated sequence is greatly superior to the original POST-C7 sequence.