Spectroscopy Interviews

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Antibody binding to human cell receptors | Image Credit: © Tatiana Shepeleva - stock.adobe.com
Using Thermostable Raman Interaction Profiling (TRIP) For Protein Binding Screening

March 1st 2024

Narangerel Altangerel, Zhenhuan Yi, and Marlan Scully of Texas A&M University recently used TRIP to analyze eight protein–ligand systems. Spectroscopy recently spoke to these three researchers about their findings and what the implications are for high-throughput drug screening.

Image Credit: © Oligo Factory
Synthesizing Synthetic Oligonucleotides: An Interview with the CEO of Oligo Factory

February 6th 2024

Female farmer gathering fresh vegetables on her farm | Image Credit: © Jacob Lund - stock.adobe.com.
Reviewing the Impact of Raman Spectroscopy on Crop Quality Assessment: An Interview with Miri Park

February 1st 2024

Layers of the planet earth and the core. Ai Generated Art | Image Credit: © unai - stock.adobe.com
Inside the Laboratory – The Petrochronology Group at University of California, Santa Barbara

January 29th 2024

Analyzing Nanoplastics: An Interview with Scientists from the Columbia University’s Climate School
Analyzing Nanoplastics: An Interview with Scientists from the Columbia University’s Climate School

January 22nd 2024

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Recording the Raman Spectrum of a Single Molecule

Recording the Raman Spectrum of a Single Molecule

September 2nd 2021

Analytical chemists are continually striving to advance techniques to make it possible to observe and measure matter and processes at smaller and smaller scales. Professor Vartkess Ara Apkarian and his team at the University of California, Irvine have made a significant breakthrough in this quest: They have recorded the Raman spectrum of a single azobenzene thiol molecule. The approach, which breaks common tenets about surface-enhanced Raman scattering/spectroscopy (SERS) and tip-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (TERS), involved imaging an isolated azobenzene thiol molecule on an atomically flat gold surface, then picking it up and recording its Raman spectrum using an electrochemically etched silver tip, in an ultrahigh vacuum cryogenic scanning tunneling microscope. For the resulting paper detailing the effort [1], Apkarian and his associates are the 2021 recipients of the William F. Meggers Award, given annually by the Society for Applied Spectroscopy to the authors of the outstanding paper appearing in the journal Applied Spectroscopy. We spoke to Apkarian about this research, and what being awarded this honor means to him and his team. This interview is part of an ongoing series with the winners of awards that are presented at the annual SciX conference. The award will be presented to Apkarian at this fall’s event, which will be held in person in Providence, Rhode Island, September 28–October 1.