An experimental method is described allowing fast field-cycling Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) experiments over a wide range of magnetic fields from 5 nT to 10 T. The method makes use of a hybrid technique: the high field range is covered by positioning the sample in the inhomogeneous stray field of the NMR spectrometer magnet. For fields below 2 mT a magnetic shield is mounted on top of the spectrometer; inside the shield the magnetic field is controlled by a specially designed coil system. This combination allows us to measure T₁-relaxation times and nuclear Overhauser effect parameters over the full range in a routine way. For coupled proton-carbon spin systems relaxation with a common T₁ is found at low fields, where the spins are “strongly coupled”. In some cases, experiments at ultralow fields provide access to heteronuclear long-lived spin states. Efficient coherent polarization transfer is seen for proton-carbon spin systems at ultralow fields as follows from the observation of quantum oscillations in the polarization evolution. Applications to analysis and the manipulation of heteronuclear spin systems are discussed.

Chemically Induced Dynamic Nuclear Polarization (CIDNP) of the diamagnetic products of radical reactions is exploited for the purpose of determination of the hyperfine coupling constants (HFCCs) of the radical intermediates. A simple proportionality relation between geminate CIDNP of a nucleus and its HFCC at the radical stage is established. The applicability range of this relation is determined: the relation is fulfilled in the case of a large difference in g-factor between the radicals involved and for the situation where the number of magnetic nuclei in the system is sufficiently large. The validity of the relation was confirmed by CIDNP experiments on radical pairs with precisely known HFCCs. Using the proportionality relation we were able to measure the HFCCs in various short-lived radicals of the amino acids histidine and tryptophan and of the S-N-centered cyclic radical of methionine derived from the methionine–glycine dipeptide in aqueous solution.