Construct · 1 fields · 3 citations

Raman effect: a standalone construct

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Ramaneffect1 CONSTRUCTRaman effectRAMAN · LIGHT SCATTERING

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Physics and chemistry

The inelastic scattering of light that shifts its wavelength

C. V. Raman and K. S. Krishnan reported the effect in 1928 in Nature, observing that when a beam of light passes through a transparent substance a small fraction of the scattered light emerges with a changed color, that is, a shifted wavelength, and the phenomenon was named the Raman effect after its discoverer. The shift had been anticipated in theory by Adolf Smekal in 1923, who predicted from quantum mechanics that scattered light could gain or lose energy in fixed amounts. In modern terms the effect is inelastic scattering: most light bounces off a molecule without changing wavelength (elastic, or Rayleigh, scattering), but a rare photon exchanges a quantum of energy with the molecule's vibration or rotation and leaves with slightly less energy (a longer wavelength, called a Stokes shift) or slightly more (an anti-Stokes shift). Because each kind of chemical bond vibrates at its own characteristic frequency, the pattern of these shifts acts as a fingerprint of molecular structure, which is why Raman spectroscopy is used across chemistry, materials science, biology, and mineralogy to identify substances without destroying the sample. The authoritative modern treatment of the theory is Derek A. Long's The Raman Effect (2002).[1][2][3]

Unit
A wavelength or wavenumber shift in scattered light, measured in reciprocal centimetres relative to the incident beam
Recovery means
Not applicable
Measured by
Detected as shifted peaks in the spectrum of light scattered from a monochromatic (usually laser) source, plotted as intensity against Raman shift in wavenumbers

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Nearby constructs

absorption6 fields · 6 citationsjingle · one word, six constructsemission2 fields · 2 citationsjingle · one word, two constructsspectrum4 fields · 4 citationsjingle · one word, four constructs

References

  1. Raman, C. V., & Krishnan, K. S. (1928). A new type of secondary radiation. Nature, 121(3048), 501–502. https://doi.org/10.1038/121501c0
  2. Smekal, A. (1923). Zur Quantentheorie der Dispersion. Die Naturwissenschaften, 11(43), 873–875. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01576902
  3. Long, D. A. (2002). The Raman effect: A unified treatment of the theory of Raman scattering by molecules. Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/0470845767

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