Raman Spectros
Raman Spectros
Raman spectroscopy has become an incredibly useful analytical technique for the
identification of organic, inorganic, and biological samples. Raman spectra can
generally be measured from solids, liquids, and gases, including thin films and
powders.
Material characterization
Pharmaceutical analysis
Disease diagnostics
Forensics
Process control
The energy increase or decrease from the excitation is related to the vibrational
energy spacing in the ground electronic state of the molecule and therefore the
wavenumber of the Stokes and anti-Stokes lines are a direct measure of the
vibrational energies of the molecule.
Ando website
Raman Spectroscopy
Rayleigh and Raman scattering (Stokes and anti-Stokes) as seen on energy level
diagram. An associated spectrum is included, note the Raman lines intensity are
greatly exaggerated. Raman spectra are usually shown in wavenumbers as a shift
from the Rayleigh scattered line.
Selection Rules
Roughly speaking the primary selection rule for a Raman transition is that
the molecular polarizability must change during the molecular vibration.
The polarizability of the molecule, a, tells us about how hard or how easy it
is for an electric field to change or distort the electron cloud in an atom or
molecule. An atom in which the electron cloud is further away from the
nucleus has a larger polarizability than an atom where the electron cloud is
closer to the nucleus.
There are several useful generalities we can make concerning Raman & IR
spectroscopy:
• symmetric vibrations lead to relatively strong Raman signals and no IR
signals.
• asymmetric vibrations lead to much weaker Raman signals and are
often quite strong in IR spectroscopy.
• bending vibrational modes lead to much weaker Raman signals and are
often quite strong in IR spectroscopy.
• a molecule can have both IR and Raman signals at the same frequency,
though if the Raman signal is strong, the corresponding IR peak will be
weak and vice versa.
Raman Spectroscopy
P E
Generally, polarizability increases as volume occupied by electrons
increases.
Though water is a very polar molecule, alkanes and other hydrophobic
molecules are more polarizable. Alkanes are the most polarizable
molecules.
Raman Imaging
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