Fundamental Concepts
Each experiment consists of a sequence of radio frequency (RF) pulses with delay periods in between them. It is the timing, frequencies, and intensities of these pulses that distinguish different NMR experiments from one another. Almost all two-dimensional experiments have four stages: the preparation period, where a magnetization coherence is created through a set of RF pulses; the evolution period, a determined length of time during which no pulses are delivered and the nuclear spins are allowed to freely precess (rotate); the mixing period, where the coherence is manipulated by another series of pulses into a state which will give an observable signal; and the detection period, in which the free induction decay signal from the sample is observed as a function of time, in a manner identical to one-dimensional FT-NMR.
The two dimensions of a two-dimensional NMR experiment are two frequency axes representing a chemical shift. Each frequency axis is associated with one of the two time variables, which are the length of the evolution period (the evolution time) and the time elapsed during the detection period (the detection time). They are each converted from a time series to a frequency series through a two-dimensional Fourier transform. A single two-dimensional experiment is generated as a series of one-dimensional experiments, with a different specific evolution time in successive experiments, with the entire duration of the detection period recorded in each experiment.
The end result is a plot showing an intensity value for each pair of frequency variables. The intensities of the peaks in the spectrum can be represented using a third dimension. More commonly, intensity is indicated using contour lines or different colors.
Read more about this topic: Two-dimensional Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy
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