Quadrupole relaxation enhancement (QRE) has been suggested as the key mechanism for a novel class of field-selective, potentially responsive magnetic resonance imaging contrast agents. In previous publications, QRE has been confirmed for solid compounds containing 209 Bi as the quadrupolar nucleus (QN). For QRE to be effective in aqueous dispersions, several conditions must be met, i.e. high transition probability of the QN at the 1 H Larmor frequency, water exchange with the bulk and comparatively slow motion of the Bi-carrying particles. In this paper, the potential influence of structural order within the compounds ('crystallinity') on QRE was studied by nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) spectroscopy in one crystalline and two amorphous preparations of Triphenylbismuth (BiPh 3). The amorphous preparations comprised (1) a shock-frozen melt and (2) a granulate of polystyrene which contained homogeneously distributed BiPh 3 after common dissolution in THF and subsequent evaporation of the solvent. In contrast to the crystalline powder which exhibits strong, narrow NQR peaks the amorphous preparations did not reveal any NQR signals above the noise floor. From these findings, we conclude that the amorphous state leads to a significant spectral peak broadening and that for efficient QRE in potential contrast agents structures with a high degree of order (near crystalline) are required.
Based on the previous identification of metastable polymorphs in crystalline triphenylbismuth by nuclear quadrupole resonance spectroscopy (NQRS), the potential formation of similar phases was studied in Tris(2-Methoxyphenyl)Bismuthine. To this end, commercial samples with known NQRS properties were molten and re-crystallized at different speeds (shock freezing in different coolants versus slow cooling inside of a heater). In all recrystallization products we have identified a new crystal phase which has not been observed after synthesis from a solution. The new crystallographic structure has been confirmed by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The newly isolated polymorph crystallizes in the monoclinic space group P2(1)/c with only one molecule in the asymmetric unit and consequently only one 5/2-7/2 transition is observed at 88.75 MHz at 310 K. In contrast, the two transitions at 89.38 and 89.29 MHz for the well-known trigonal polymorph originate from two crystallographically distinct molecules of Tris(2-methoxy-Phenyl)Bismuthine in the asymmetric unit. Additional relaxometric NQRS shows distinctly different T2 relaxation times for the new polymorph when compared to the original samples. Additional phase transitions could not be observed during temperature sweeps between 153K and 323K.
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