Who doesn’t want to start the day with a warm cup of coffee? Coffee has a stimulating effect on humans because of its caffeine content and for that reason it has become one of the most popular drinks in the world. Some clinical studies actually suggest that small amounts of caffeine everyday might be beneficial for adults. In this blog I am going to highlight an experiment done in collaboration with the Swager group at MIT using an organometallic complex to quantify the caffeine content in regular coffee without sample preparation!

In the average case one can simply dissolve an analyte in an appropriate deuterated solvent and acquire a simple 1D spectrum to obtain all the required structural information. However, sometimes doing so may not provide you with all of the information you need!

NMR spectroscopy is by far the most useful characterization technique in organic chemistry, especially if you have to elucidate the structure or configuration of your products. Arguably, 2D experiments such as COSY, HSQC, and HMBC have simplified this task tremendously. In this post I wanted to highlight the COSY of α-humulene. Read more.

What is process analytical technology (PAT) and why is it so important?PAT is an extremely powerful and useful tool for analyzing, optimizing and controlling chemical processes. Chemical, food and pharmaceutical industries could especially benefit from this technique. In earlier days, chemical processes were primarily monitored by physical techniques, such as temperature, pH, pressure etc..