Hyperpolarizing Water with Parahydrogen

Studies of water-based systems are of fundamental interest for nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as water is the most abundant and important medium for global living. Hence, increasing the polarization of water and dissolved compounds is particularly attractive for biomedical applications such as investigations of intermolecular interactions and metabolite structures as well as for imaging purposes. In this work, we show a new approach based on para enriched hydrogen (p-H₂ ) that enables the hyperpolarization of bulk water if a suitable catalytic system is employed. The results indicate that the polarization is transferred by a new exchange mechanism.