Title: Raman scattering
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - Raman scattering
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.08667
Status: current

Definition
Inelastic scattering of electromagnetic radiation by molecules that are excited to higher energy levels.

Notes
1) Normal Raman scattering occurs through changes in polarizability of a molecule during a vibration, not the hyper-polarizabilities, and is excited by radiation that is not in resonance with electronic transitions in the sample.
2) The energy of the scattered photon can be lesser (Stokes Raman scattering) or greater (anti-Stokes Raman scattering) than that of the incident photon.

Related Terms
- Stokes Raman scattering: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/08683
- anti-Stokes Raman scattering: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/08570
- electromagnetic radiation: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/08242
- electronic transitions: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/08245
- energy levels: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/08246

Source
- PAC, 2021, 93, 647. 'Glossary of methods and terms used in analytical spectroscopy (IUPAC Recommendations 2019)' on page 761 (https://doi.org/10.1515/pac-2019-0203)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/08667/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/08667/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/08667/xml

Citation: Citation: 'Raman scattering' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.08667
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Accessed: 2026-06-29T01:45:17+00:00