NMR spectroscopy is a powerful tool for determining the structure of isolated natural products. The use of 1H and 13C NMR chemical shifts is the most important parameter in this process since it reflects the local chemical environment of the individual protons and carbons within the compound.
The dramatic increase in power of modern computer workstations, coupled with advances in software, has made it possible to calculate the chemical shifts for a given compound and use them to help guide the elucidation of the structure or support the proposed structure of the natural product.
An overview of the application of density functional theory to the calculation of 1H and 13C chemical shifts and structure verification of marine terpenes will be discussed.
These examples will include: