Intelligent NMR Clipboard

The clipboard is for sure one of the most useful features in any modern Operating System and it is used for short-term data storage and/or data transfer between documents or applications, via copy and paste operations. Any modern application should support clipboard operations and, of course, Mnova is no exception. However, Mnova goes one step further compared to other applications as I will try to show in this post.

Following the same principles as standard Office applications, with Mnova you can copy any object (e.g. spectra, molecules, etc) into the clipboard and paste it either in Mnova (for example in a different page) or in any other application such as MS Office. The peculiar thing is that once a spectrum has been transferred to the clipboard (via Ctrl/Cmd+C), you can ‘paste’ it into another spectrum. Several examples will illustrate this feature.
 
Example #1

You have processed a spectrum and integrated carefully in order to quantify some signals of interest. Next you realize that you also want to integrate a different spectrum but using exactly the same integral regions as those in the first spectrum. There are several ways to do that in Mnova, but a very simple one involves copying the first spectrum into the clipboard and then selecting ‘Paste Properties/NMR Integrals’ from the Edit (or Home) menu. You can paste these integrals either to a single spectrum or to a bunch of selected spectra (or pages). The same can be used for the peaks

The same can be done with the multiplets.

The paste option takes into account if both spectra have compatible nucleus, so if a 1H is copied, the integrals/multiplets will be pasted in another 1H but not in a 13C.

When the spectra have compatible nucleus but different dimensions, the pasting is done as:

- If the copied spectrum is a 1D and the pasted spectrum is a homonuclear 2D, the new 2D region is created by taking the 1D range for both dimensions.

- If the copied spectrum is a homonuclear 2D and the pasted spectrum is a 1D, the new 1D region is created by taking the horizontal range of the 2D region.

- If the copied spectrum is a heteronuclear 2D and the pasted spectrum is a 1D, the new 1D region is created by taking the range corresponding to the dimension with the same nucleus as the 1D spectrum. If the spectrum is a homonuclear 2D, the new 2D region is created by taking the range corresponding to the current nucleus for both dimensions.

If the copied spectrum has multiplets but no integrals, the option Paste NMR Integrals is enabled (it will copy the integration regions of the multiplets). And the same, if the copied spectrum has integrals but no multiplets, the option Paste NMR Multiplets is enabled (it will copy the integration regions).

Note: when the copied spectrum is 1D and pasted spectrum is 2D, new regions will be created with all possible combinations of the 1D regions (if N 1D regions, then N 2 2D regions). In the case of integrals; all the resulting integrals will be pasted, but in the case of multiplets only the resulting multiplets with peaks will be pasted.
 
Example #2

You have customized the graphical properties of a spectrum (e.g. fonts, colors, grid, etc) and you find that you want to rapidly apply the same graphical settings to another spectrum. Once more, this is very easy with the clipboard: copy the first spectrum (Ctrl/Cmd+C) and then select the target spectrum and issue command ‘Paste NMR Graphic Properties’.

See also this blog post

Example 3 (NMR Peaks & Snap)

When copying the peaks to a new spectrum, Mnova has an option to automatically snap the peaks to its nearest peak. A peak that would be automatically picked using the current peak picking threshold. For this option, the user is able to define a chemical shift window (the maximum chemical shift changes expected in f1 and f2).  
 

Mnova also allows the user to click-drag and move a peak label to a new location, by using the 'Move Peaks' tool under the Peak Picking menu.

Example 4 (Zoom&Cuts)

This option will be used to copy the zoom and cuttings from one spectrum to another (or others). The same concept can be applied to blind regions

Example 5 (NMR assignments)

This feature will copy the assignments from one molecule to another. The mechanism will be: Ctrl/Cmd+C in the assigned molecule, followed by clicking on the new molecule and applying 'Edit(Home)/Paste Properties/NMR Assignments' command. Please bear in mind that the numbering of the common parts of both molecules must be the same.

Another way would be to just copy&paste the molecular structure with the assignments and make the structural changes in one of the molecules.

Example 6 (NMR Fit Regions)

This feature will be useful to paste the line fitting regions and peaks from one spectrum to another. One you have applied the Line Fitting over the first spectrum, you will only need to 'Ctrl+C' and follow the menu 'Home/Paste/NMR Fit Regions'. A new dialog box will be displayed with the options below:

- The Regions option pastes only the regions and fulfill them with an automatic peak picking. The regions are bounded to the current spectrum's range.

- The Regions & Peaks option pastes the regions and their peaks, exactly as they are in the copied spectrum (same Shift, Height, Width, and L/G).

- The All option pastes the regions, peaks and locks, exactly as they are in the copied spectrum.

- The Apply Fitting option executes the fitting of the regions after pasting them.