Fundamentals of raman spectroscopy

A brief history

Raman was first discovered by C.V. Raman and K.F. Krishnan in 1928. In 1930, C.V. Raman was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for this discovery. During the 1930s, Raman was recognized as a principle means of nondestructive chemical analysis. During this time, challenges were also discovered. These included the lack of a good Raman source, lack of a good detector, and interference from fluorescence, which in some cases could overwhelm the Raman signal.

During the 1960s, there was revived interest in Raman due to the advent of lasers, and in 1986, the first Fourier-transform (FT) Raman instrumentation was developed. Fourier-transform Raman provided a way to overcome problems with fluorescence, making the technique much more viable for researchers. In the 1990s, dispersive Raman instrumentation was developed, and included the advancement of compact near-infrared (NIR) lasers, multichannel detectors, and fiber-optic probes. This time also saw the advent of portable integrated dispersive Raman systems. All of this led to Raman becoming a much more viable technique for a variety of different fields and a number of applications.

Benefits of Raman

Raman spectroscopy is a form of molecular spectroscopy that involves the scattering of electromagnetic radiation by atoms or molecules. It probes the vibrational, rotational, and other low-frequency modes of molecules; the Raman signal is observed as inelastically scattered light.