Single-beam spectrally controlled two-dimensional Raman spectroscopy

Abstract

Vibrational modes are often localized in certain regions of a molecule, and so the coupling between these modes is sensitive to the molecular structure. Two-dimensional vibrational spectroscopy can probe the strength of this coupling in a manner analogous to two-dimensional NMR spectroscopy, but on ultrafast timescales. Here, we demonstrate how two-dimensional Raman spectroscopy, based on fifth-order optical nonlinearity, can be performed with a single beam of shaped femtosecond optical pulses. Our spectroscopy scheme offers not only a major simplification of the conventional set-up, but also an inherent elimination of a competing nonlinear signal, which overwhelms the desired signal in other schemes and carries no coupling information. 2D Raman spectroscopy, based on fifth-order optical nonlinearity, is performed with a single beam of shaped fs optical pulses. The scheme inherently eliminates the cascade signal, making the vibrational coupling information easy to extract.