The Soft Matter Spectroscopy Laboratory ('SMS LAB') is a research laboratory at the Dipartimento di Chimica e Chimica Industriale of the University of Pisa. Our research activities and projects cover several topics from physical chemistry of materials to chemistry education.
Our 'traditional' research is related to the chemical-physical study of soft materials, such as Liquid Crystals (LCs) and Liquid Crystal Elastomers (LCEs) mainly by means of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR). The aim of these research is to understand the relationship among the physical properties (i.e. optical and electro-optical ones in the case of liquid crystals, and mechanical / elastic and thermo-mechanical ones in the case of liquid crystalline elastomers) and the molecular properties (chemical structure, average conformation, molecular packing and ordering properties). Our expertises in this field include NMR spectroscopy (1H, 13C, 2H, ...), 1H NMR relaxometry and 1H NMR diffusometry.
In the last ten years, we moved our interests also in the field of food and agricultural products, such as olive and other seed oils, honey and pollens, wine and other drinks. In this field, we combine different spectroscopic techniques from front-face and right-angle fluorescence spectroscopy to UV-vis absorption, FT-IR and quantitative NMR techniques.
Another research topic is related to Chemistry Education.