An improved experimental scheme to measure self-diffusion coefficients of biomolecules with an advantageous use of radiation damping

An improved nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experimental scheme to measure self-diffusion coefficients of biomolecules in 95% H2O using pulsed-magnetic-field gradients is presented. The radiation damping of water, which deleteriously effects the quality of the spectra in high-field NMR, is advantageously used in reducing the water signal. The enhancements of the new sequence, designated BPP-SED, a novel combination of BPP-LED (bipolar-gradient-pulse pair longitudinal eddy current delay) and SED (selective echo dephasing) is demonstrated by measuring self-diffusion coefficients of dilute protein samples (0.5 mM) in limited volumes (250 μl).