Interpretation of NMR Relaxation as a Tool for Characterising the Adsorption Strength of Liquids inside Porous Materials

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) relaxation times are shown to provide a unique probe of adsorbate–adsorbent interactions in liquid-saturated porous materials. A short theoretical analysis is presented, which shows that the ratio of the longitudinal to transverse relaxation times (T1/T2) is related to an adsorbate–adsorbent interaction energy, and we introduce a quantitative metric esurf (based on the relaxation time ratio) characterising the strength of this surface interaction. We then consider the interaction of water with a range of oxide surfaces (TiO2 anatase, TiO2 rutile, γ-Al2O3, SiO2, θ-Al2O3 and ZrO2) and show that esurf correlates with the strongest adsorption sites present, as determined by temperature programmed desorption (TPD). Thus we demonstrate that NMR relaxation measurements have a direct physical interpretation in terms of the characterisation of activation energy of desorption from the surface. Further, for a series of chemically similar solid materials, in this case a range of oxide materials, for which at least two calibration values are obtainable by TPD, the esurf parameter yields a direct estimate of the maximum activation energy of desorption from the surface. The results suggest that T1/T2 measurements may become a useful addition to the methods available to characterise liquid-phase adsorption in porous materials. The particular motivation for this work is to characterise adsorbate–surface interactions in liquid-phase catalysis.