Solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance studies at ambient and cryogenic temperatures

The research work presented in this thesis was concentrated on the study of solid materials at ambient temperature, and the study of matrix-isolated materials at cryogenic temperatures. The first was directed to the examination of organolithium and organocopper compounds with particular interest in nuclear quadrupolar effects and their relation to molecular structure. All the compounds studied were air and moisture sensitive, which made necessary the design and construction of special rotor inserts to prevent the decomposition of these materials. A series of LiBH(_4)X(_n) compounds were studied. They showed a good correlation between the symmetry of the Li-X bonds and the quadrupole coupling constants, which allows the prediction of molecular structures for some of the complexes. The design and construction of an integrated NMR-cryogenic system was carried out for the deposition and study of matrix-isolated materials. A full description of the system and the way it is assembled is presented. A method to determine the sample temperature is introduced where the NMR signal from the deposited sample is used as a probe. CH(_2)Cl(_2) and C(_2)H(_4) in Ar matrices at different molar fractions were studied . The inter-proton distance was obtained for theCH(_2)Cl(_2) case. This work also shows a relation between the degree of isolation and the multi-exponential T(_1) behaviour

Magazines for youth? : a comparative content analysis of two New Zealand juvenile periodicals

This research project investigated the readership of two New Zealand youth magazines during the period 1945-1947. The magazines, Conquest: the magazine for youth, and Junior Digest: the magazine for girls and boys, were subjected to a content analysis which attempted to capture details of the readers, and describe the types of articles in each magazine in an attempt to discover what kinds of reading tastes young people of the period had. The project produced a description of the kinds of content that were present in the two magazines and in what quantities. By combining this content analysis with demographic data of the readers themselves, who contributed to the magazines by sending letters, jokes, competition entries and jokes, this research was able to show who the specific group of readers were and make conclusions about what they liked. By contrasting the results, it was determined that there were slight differences in the content of the magazines which may have accounted for the failure of Conquest to continue after July 1947, but that the data provided by the content analysis alone was insufficient to allow insight into the broader periodical reading tastes of New Zealand youth in the second half of the 1940s

Interpolymer Complexation: Comparisons of Bulk and Interfacial Structures

The interactions between the strong polyelectrolyte sodium poly(styrenesulfonate), NaPSS, and the neutral polymer poly(vinylpyrrolidone), PVP, were investigated in bulk and at the silica/solution interface using a combination of diffusion nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR), small-angle neutron scattering (SANS), solvent relaxation NMR, and ellipsometry. We show for the first time that complex formation occurs between NaPSS and PVP in solution; the complexes formed were shown not to be influenced by pH variation, whereas increasing the ionic strength increases the complexation of NaPSS but does not influence the PVP directly. The complexes formed contained a large proportion of NaPSS. Study of these interactions at the silica interface demonstrated that complexes also form at the nanoparticle interface where PVP is added in the system prior to NaPSS. For a constant PVP concentration and varying NaPSS concentration, the system remains stable until NaPSS is added in excess, which leads to depletion flocculation. Surface complex formation using the layer-by-layer technique was also reported at a planar silica interfac