Parameter independent low-power heteronuclear decoupling for fast magic-angle spinning solid-state NMR

Major advances have recently been made in the field of heteronuclear dipolar decoupling in solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). These developments have improved the resolution and sensitivity of the NMR spectrum of spins coupled to protons. One such new scheme, denoted as rCW^ApA, has proven to be robust with practically no need for parameter optimization [A. Equbal et al. Chem. Phys. Lett., 635, 339 (2015)]. Most of the experiments with rCW^ApA have been carried out in the regimes of slow to moderate magic-angle spinning while simultaneously applying high decoupling radio-frequency amplitudes. Here, we explore the performance of the rCW^ApA sequence and its predecessor rCW^A in the regime of low-power radio-frequency irradiation and fast magic-angle spinning. The robustness of the refocused continuous-wave (rCW) schemes to experimental parameters such as pulse lengths and offset irradiation is demonstrated. Numerical simulations and analytical theory have been used to understand the effects of various nuclear spin interactions on the decoupling performance of the low-power rCW decoupling scheme relative to other decoupling methods. This has lead to the design of an “optimum low-power decoupling sequence” that can be used without parameter optimization. This result is particularly important in the context of samples with low signal to noise.