• Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy is used for analysing organic compounds
• Atoms with odd mass numbers usually show signals on NMR
  • For example isotopes of atoms
  • Many of the carbon atoms on organic molecules are carbon-12
  • A small quantity of organic molecules will contain the isotope carbon-13 atoms
  • These will show signals on a?13C NMR
• In?13C NMR, the magnetic field strengths of carbon-13 atoms in organic compounds are measured and recorded on a spectrum
• Just as in?1H NMR, all samples are measured against a reference compound – Tetramethylsilane (TMS)
• On a?13C NMR spectrum, non-equivalent carbon atoms appear as peaks with different chemical shifts

Chemical shift values (relative to the TMS) for?13C NMR analysis table

Features of a?13C NMR spectrum

• 13C NMR spectrum displays sharp single signals – there aren’t any complicated spitting pattern as seen with?1H NMR spectra
• The height of each signal is not proportional to the number of carbon atoms present in a single molecular environment
• CDCl3?is used as a solvent to dissolve samples for?13C NMR
  • On spectra, a single solvent peak appears at 80 ppm caused by?13C atoms in the CDCl
  • This can be ignored when interpreting?13C spectra

Identifying?13C molecular environments

• On an organic molecule, the carbon-13 environments can be identified in a similar way to the proton environments in?1H NMR
• For example propanone
  • There are 2 molecular environments
  • 2 signals will be present on its?13C NMR spectrum

There are 2 molecular environments in propanone

The?13C NMR of propanone showing 2 signals for the 2 molecular environments