VISPA

IPCF houses a facility entirely dedicated to vibrational spectroscopy, which boasts state-of-the-art instrumentation. Within the institute (which was born as an institute of spectroscopic techniques) there have always been strong skills concerning structural studies on materials of different nature using spectroscopic techniques, this has meant that over the years the present “fleet” has been enriched with more and more efficient instrumentation.

Particular attention has been paid over time to Raman spectroscopy (macro, micro, nano, FT-Raman) and its applications in various fields, for this purpose we make use of both fixed and mobile instrumentation and instrumentation capable of providing complementary information which will be detailed later.

The facility also includes laboratories and support methodologies (detailed below) able to fabricate on demand different substrates for different applications. SERS (Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy) spectroscopic sensors are developed here; innovative sampling techniques useful for the identification of organic and inorganic molecules and able to overcome the intrinsic difficulties of the Raman technique related to the strong fluorescence background that some substances typically show.

• For the Raman and SERS investigations, the Jobin-Yvon LabRAM HR-800 spectrometer is used, equipped with various microscope optics and various lasers ranging from UV to infrared.
• Alternatively, depending on the instrumental performances and applications required, it is possible to use a U1000 Jobin-Yvon spectrometer (double monochromator) equipped with microscope optics, cryostat and Ar laser, which boasts high resolution and also allows shape analysis of line.
• The instrumentation available for FT-IR investigations is a VERTEX70 spectrometer associated with a RAMII and RamanScopeIII module for FT-Raman investigations. The VERTEX70 with the source indoors and at room temperature it can cover a spectral range between 6000 cm-1 and 130 cm-1 and can be equipped withoptical components to extend the rangebetween 28000 cm-1 and 15 cm-1. The RAMII module is equipped withNd:YAG laser (1064 nm) and covers a spectral range between 3600 cm-1 and 50 cm-1. The RamanScope III module allows FT-Raman investigations in microscopy using the same source as the RAMII module. It is possiblewith this technology to generate high resolutionRaman images and mappings in a few minutes.
• TERS investigations are possible using the Xplora Plus (Horiba Scientific) coupled to an AIST-NT scanning probe microscope operating in STM (Scanning Tunneling Microscopy) mode. The gold probes are illuminated with 638nm laser light in
  order to excite the plasmonic mode of the tip with the consequent amplification of the electromagnetic field. 

• Strong skills in chemistry and computationalphysics are made available to users to carry out theoretical Raman experiments (NMR andIR) to simulate the interaction between molecule/layer and substrate;for this purpose a workstation is specially dedicated.