Nuclear quadrupole spin–lattice relaxation due to molecular reorientations in crystals with orientational disorder

p-chloronitrobenzene (PCNB) and p-chlorobromobenzene (PCBB) crystallize in the centrosymmetric space group P21/c with two molecules per unit cell. The space lattice will have an equal number of points with molecules facing in opposite directions. As a consequence, these compounds exhibit an orientational rigid disorder. In this work, we have measured the temperature dependence of the chlorine nuclear quadrupole spin–lattice relaxation time (T1), linewidth, and resonance frequency for both compounds for temperatures higher than 80 K. Both compounds exhibit an inhomogeneously broadened line shape and a “normal” Bayer-type temperature dependence of the resonance frequency. The analysis focuses on the identification of the dominant relaxation process at high temperatures (T>240 K in PCNB and T>260 K in PCBB). It is shown that T1(T) reflects the existence of 180° molecular reorientations through a modulation of the crystalline contribution to the electric field gradient.