Application of Surface Coil for Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Studies of Semi-conducting Thin Films

Abstract: We conduct a comprehensive set of tests of performance of surface coils used for nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) study of quasi 2-dimensional samples. We report ${^{115} \rm{In}}$ and ${^{31} \rm{P}}$ NMR measurements on InP, semi-conducting thin substrate samples. Surface coils of both zig-zag meander-line and concentric spiral geometries were used. We compare reception sensitivity and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of NMR signal obtained by using surface-type coils to that obtained by standard solenoid-type coils. As expected, we find that surface-type coils provide better sensitivity for NMR study of thin films samples. Moreover, we compare the reception sensitivity of different types of the surface coils. We identify the optimal geometry of the surface coils for a given application and/or direction of the applied magnetic field.