An easy-built Halbach magnet for LF-NMR with high homogeneity using optimized target-field passive shimming method #Instrumentation

Published: Wednesday, 06 March 2024 - 10:00 -0400

Author: Thorsten Maly

Yang, Lize, Fang Chen, Li Chen, Zhi Zhang, Junfei Chen, Jiaxin Wang, Xin Cheng, Jiwen Feng, Qingjia Bao, and Chaoyang Liu. “An Easy-Built Halbach Magnet for LF-NMR with High Homogeneity Using Optimized Target-Field Passive Shimming Method.” Journal of Magnetic Resonance 357 (December 2023): 107582.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmr.2023.107582.

The aim of this work is to develop a Halbach magnet that possesses characteristics such as easy-built, low cost and high homogeneity for use in a portable low-field NMR (LF-NMR) system. Considering portability, a 4-ring Halbach magnet was designed through simulation and mechanical modelling, which was successfully con­ structed in a general laboratory setting. The obtained field strength (B0) was 0.169 T, with an initial homogeneity of 8204 ppm within a sphere with a diameter of 20 mm. To enhance robustness, efficiency and effectiveness of shimming, an optimized target-field passive shimming method was proposed. Subsequently, the homemade spectrometer was used to run NMR experiments on the Halbach magnet. The 1H NMR linewidths of water samples became significantly narrower after passive shimming, e.g., the linewidth of a sample with a diameter of 3 mm and a length of 3 mm reduced from 452.3 Hz (62.5 ppm) to 12.9 Hz (1.8 ppm), which was much less than 102 Hz. The NMR results demonstrate that the proposed passive shimming method can achieve high homoge­ neity, and the developed Halbach magnet is capable of satisfying numerous LF-NMR applications.