Recently, ammonia borane has increasingly attracted researchers’ attention because of its merging applications, such as organic synthesis, boron nitride compounds synthesis, and hydrogen storage. This dissertation presents the results from several studies related to ammonia borane. The pressure-induced tetragonal to orthorhombic phase transition in ammonia borane was studied in a diamond anvil cell using in situ Raman spectroscopy. We found a positive Clapeyron-slope for this phase transformation in the experiment, which implies that the phase transition from tetragonal to orthorhombic is exothermic. The result of this study indicates that the rehydrogenation of the high pressure orthorhombic phase is expected to be easier than that of the ambient pressure tetragonal phase due to its lower enthalpy. The high pressure behavior of ammonia borane after thermal decomposition was studied by in situ Raman spectroscopy at high pressures up to 10 GPa. The sample of ammonia borane was first decomposed at ~140 degree Celcius and ~0.7 GPa and then compessed step wise in an isolated sample chamber of a diamond anvil cell for Raman spectroscopy measurement. We did not observe the characteristic shift of Raman mode under high pressure due to dihydrogen bonding, indicating that the dihydrogen bonding disappears in the decomposed ammonia borane. Although no chemical rehydrogenation was detected in this study, the decomposed ammonia borane could store extra hydrogen by physical absorption. The effect of nanoconfinement on ammonia borane at high pressures and different temperatures was studied. Ammonia borane was mixed with a type of mesoporous silica, SBA-15, and restricted within a small space of nanometer scale. The nano-scale ammonia borane was decomposed at ~125 degree Celcius in a diamond anvil cell and rehydrogenated after applying high pressures up to ~13 GPa at room temperature. The successful rehydrogenation of decomposed nano-scale ammonia borane gives guidance to further investigations on hydrogen storage. In addition, the high pressure behavior of lithium amidoborane, one derivative of ammonia borane, was studied at different temperatures. Lithium amidoborane (LAB) was decomposed and recompressed in a diamond anvil cell. After applying high pressures on the decomposed lithium amidoborane, its recovery peaks were discovered by Raman spectroscopy. This result suggests that the decomposition of LAB is reversible at high pressures.

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Raman spectroscopy involves change in the polarizability of the molecular system on excitation and is based on scattering process. Spontaneous Raman scattering is a two photon process, in which the input light initiates the excitation, which then leads to an emission of another photon due to scattering. It is extensively used to understand molecular properties. As spontaneous Raman scattering is a weak process, the detection of these weak Raman photons are rather difficult. Alternatively, resonance Raman (RR) scattering is another technique where the excitation wavelength is chosen according to the material under study. The excitation wavelength is chosen to be within the absorption spectrum of the material under study. RR spectroscopy not only provides considerable improvement in the intensity of the Raman signal, but also provides mode specific information i.e. the modes which are Franck-Condon active in that transition can be observed. There are reports on RR studies of many systems using pulsed light as an excitation source. It is necessary to use at least two pulsed laser sources for carrying out the time resolved RR spectroscopy. A single pulse source for excitation would lead to compromise either with temporal or spectral resolution which is due to the uncertainty principle. If an excitation pulse has pulse width of ~100 femtoseconds then the spectral resolution will be ~ 150 cm-1. It is clear now that for improving the temporal and spectral resolution simultaneously, usage of single pulse for Raman experiments (spontaneous scattering) is not adequate. The usage of multiple laser pulses may provide the way out to improve the resolutions. Nonlinear spectroscopy in a broad view helps in understanding the structural and dynamical properties of the molecular systems in a deeper manner. There are a number of techniques as a part of nonlinear spectroscopy that have emerged in due course to meet different requirements and to overcome some difficulties while understanding the molecular properties. Stimulated Raman (SRS) gain, coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) and the inverse Raman spectroscopy are a few to mention as third order nonlinear spectroscopic techniques which give the similar kind of information about the molecular systems. Stimulated Raman scattering is a more general process involved in nonlinear Raman processes. SRS involves at least two laser pulses and the difference in their frequencies should match with the vibrational frequency of the molecule. The polarization has to be matched between the Raman pump and the Raman probe pulses. We have developed a new nonlinear Raman technique in our laboratory named as ultrafast Raman loss spectroscopy (URLS) using the principles of nonlinear Raman scattering. It involves the Raman pump (~ 1 picosecond (ps) or ~ 15 cm-1spectral resolution) and Raman probe as a white light continuum (100 fs) whose frequency components ranges from 400-900 nm. The laser system consists of Tsunami which is pumped by a Millennia laser and Spitfire-Pro, a regenerative amplifier which is pumped by an Empower laser. Tsunami provides a 100 fs, 780 nm centered, 80 MHz and ~6 nJ energy laser pulses. The Tsunami output is fed into Spitfire to amplify its energy and change the repetition rate to 1 KHz. The pulse length of the input pulse is preserved in amplification. The output of amplifier is split into two equal parts; one part is used to pump the Optical Parametric Amplifier (OPA) in order to generate wavelengths in the range 480-800 nm. The output of the OPA is utilized to generate Raman pump which has to be in ps in order to get the best spectral resolution. A small portion of the other part of amplifier output is utilized to generate white light source for the Raman probe. The remaining part of the amplifier output is used to pump TOPAS to generate wavelengths in the ultraviolet region. URLS has been applied to many molecular systems which range from non-fluorescent to highly fluorescent. URLS has been demonstrated to be very sensitive and useful while dealing with highly fluorescent systems. URLS is a unique technique due to its high sensitivity and the Raman loss signal intensity is at least 1.5-2 times higher as compared to the Raman gain signal intensities. Cresyl violet perchlorate (CVP) is a highly fluorescent system. URLS has been applied to study CVP even at resonance excitation. Rhodamine B has also been studied using URLS. Spontaneous Raman scattering is very difficult to observe experimentally in such high quantum yield fluorescent systems. The variation in the lineshapes of the Raman bands for different RP excitation wavelengths in URLS spectra shows the mode dependent behavior of the absorption spectrum. The experimental observation of variation in the lineshape has been accounted using theoretical formalism. The thesis is focused on discussing the development of the new nonlinear Raman spectroscopic technique URLS in detail and its applicability to molecular systems for better understanding. A theoretical formalism for accounting the uniqueness of URLS among the other nonlinear Raman techniques is developed and discussed in various pictorial representations i.e. ladder, Feynman and closed loop diagrams. A brief overview of nonlinear spectroscopy and nonlinear Raman spectroscopy is presented for demonstrating the difference between the URLS and the other nonlinear Raman techniques.

Raman biosensors are appealing for many biomedical applications, due to their accuracy and speed. In addition, Raman microscopy is a non-labeled imaging technique that offers chemical contrast based on Raman vibrational frequencies. However, the weak Raman signal represents a significant obstacle to using Raman in biological applications. The objective of my PhD research, presented in this thesis, is to enhance the Raman signal, thereby enabling it to be used in a wide variety of biomedical applications. More specifically, the research focuses on two different Raman signal enhancement techniques. The first is to improve the Raman signal using hollow-core photonic crystal fibers; this enhanced the Raman signal of ethanol 40 times. The second approach is by generating a coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS) signal. We demonstrated CARS microscopy of myelin (lipid-rich) structures using a single femtosecond Ti:sapphire laser, and a photonic crystal fiber (PCF) with two closely lying zero dispersion wavelengths (ZDWs). Generating low noise supercontinuum (Stokes beam) out of two closely lying ZDW PCFs, enabled us to perform fast data acquisition (84 μs per pixel) CARS imaging using a homebuilt microscope. However, the application of this fiber is often limited to CARS imaging of molecular species with vibrations at wavenumbers ≥ 2000 cm−1 Raman shift. In addition, as it is not a polarization maintaining fiber, it cannot be used for polarization CARS microscopy. A polarization-maintaining PCF with two far-lying zero dispersion wavelengths offers important advantages for polarization CARS microscopy, and for CARS imaging in the fingerprint region. This PCF, though commercially available, has had limited use for CARS microscopy in the C-H bond region. The main problem is that the supercontinuum from this fiber is typically noisier than that from a standard PCF with two closely-lying zero dispersion wavelengths. To overcome this, we determined the optimum operating conditions for generating a low-noise supercontinuum out of a PCF with two far-lying zero dispersion wavelengths, in terms of the input parameters of the excitation pulse. We measured the relative intensity noise (RIN) of the Stokes and the corresponding CARS signal, as a function of the input laser parameters in this fiber. We demonstrated that the results of CARS imaging using this alternate fiber are comparable to those achieved using the standard fiber for input laser pulse conditions of low average power, narrow pulse width with a slightly positive chirp, and polarization direction parallel to the slow axis of the selected fiber. Finally, we demonstrated a novel fiber-delivered, portable, multimodal CARS exoscope, for minimally invasive in-vivo imaging of tissues. The device was based on a micro-electromechanical system-scanning mirror and miniaturized optics, and light delivery by photonic crystal fibre. A single Ti:sapphire femtosecond laser approach is used to produce CARS and two photon excitation fluorescent and second harmonic generation images of different samples using the new setup. The high resolution and distortion-free images achieved with various samples, particularly in the reverse direction (epi), successfully demonstrate proof of concept, and paves the way to minimally or non-invasive in vivo imaging. Moreover, combining this novel endoscope with a portable femtosecond fiber laser will accelerate delivering multimodal nonlinear imaging endoscopy/microscopy to clinical bed-side applications.

In situ Raman spectroscopy was used to explore etching of carbon nanotubes as well as their growth from C60. The thesis is in three parts: (1) C60 seed particles were partially oxidized in air and were used to grow carbon nanotubes and other nanocarbon structures. Seed oxidization was characterized by monitoring the evolution of the Raman Ag(2) peak and the D band, and oxidation temperature was found to be critical to nanotube growth. (2) To further explore oxidation, carbon nanotubes were thermally oxidized in air at different temperatures, while the evolution of different Raman bands was tracked. Etching dynamics and band intensity evolution were tracked in situ. Notably, metallic species were found to etch much more rapidly than semiconducting species of similar diameter. (3) To confirm and expand on this, a novel, simultaneous two-laser Raman spectroscopy setup was used to track the thermal oxidation of carbon nanotubes in O2 and CO2 gases at different temperatures. Metallic species were resonant with one laser line, while semiconducting species were resonant with the other, so changes to sample metallicity could be tracked unambiguously in two separate spectra. Again, metals were found to etch more rapidly. In situ Raman spectroscopy can track the evolution of nanotubes in real time and provide insight into processing. In general, detailed process monitoring like this can help in the development of selective synthesis and processing.

The Ottawa Embayment is a intracratonic rift basin that preserves a unique and eventful history through deep time. Its evolution records opening of the Iapetus Ocean with the break-up of Rodinia, followed by the formation of a continental passive margin, trapping siliciclastic sediments eroded from the adjacent Grenville Province. Samples were collected from a transect across the crystalline rift flank and through the embayment. We investigate the influence of crystallinitiy and non-ideal crystal chapes on He diffusion and resulting zircon (U-Th)/He age with the use of zircon (U-Th)/He thermochronometry, raman spectroscopy and x-ray micro-computed tomography. We then integrate our thermochronology data with regional geology to utilize multi-sample numerical modelling to improve our understanding of the thermal history of the Ottawa Embayment and the evolution of intracratonic rift basins. The works collected within define a comprehensive temperature-time history for the basin and rift flank from the Late-Mesoproterozoic to present day.

Contexte : L'histologie rénale est une pierre angulaire de la prise en charge néphrologique mais plusieurs facteurs en limitent les capacités nécessitant le développement de nouvelles techniques. La spectroscopie vibrationnelle (SV), Raman (SR) et infrarouge (FTIR), apporte des informations moléculaires et structurelles de manière reproductible sans préparation préalable des échantillons tissulaires la rendant apte à lever ces limitations. Objectif : L'objectif de ce travail est de démontrer l'intérêt de la SV et son potentiel à apporter des informations à partir des biopsies rénales, actuellement indisponibles via les techniques habituelles. Design : Nous avons recherché dans le rein : 1) Des molécules exogènes : Hydroxyethyl amidon (HEA) 2) Des molécules endogènes : les produits de glycation avancée (AGEs) 3) La quantification de structures pathologiques: fibrose et inflammation. Résultats : 1) L'HEA a été détectée par SR dans des biopsies rénales de patients exposés à cette molécule exogène affirmant son accumulation rénale. La quantification de l'HEA par SR sur des biopsies de greffons rénaux a permis d'associer son accumulation à une bonne qualité du greffon estimée par un score de risque du donneur (KDRI) et la fonction rénale à 3 mois de la greffe. 2) 4 AGEs ont été cartographiés et quantifiés dans des glomérules diabétiques et normaux par SR. Ils étaient augmentés dans les glomérules diabétiques vs normaux. Une faible proportion des AGEs a été retrouvée colocalisée au collagène dans les glomérules diabétiques et non dans les glomérules normaux. 3) La fibrose interstitielle et l'inflammation ont été automatiquement quantifiée par FTIR sur 166 biopsies de greffons rénaux de manière reproductible et robuste. La pertinence clinique de cette technique a été prouvée par une bonne corrélation avec la fonction rénale. Conclusion : La SV possède un fort potentiel en néphrologie avec de multiples applications en recherche comme en pratique clinique. / Background: Renal biopsy is a main feature of diagnosis and prognosis in nephrology but it still have some limitation which need further techniques to be more reliable. Vibrational spectroscopy (VS) including Raman spectroscopy (RS) and Fourier-transformed infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) bring out some molecular and structural data from tissue analysis. Objective: We aimed to prove VS is able to provide histologic data actually unattainable by classical techniques. Design: We searched in renal biopsies: 1) Exogenous molecules: Hydroxyethyl starch (HES) 2) Endogenous molecules: Advanced glycation end-product (AGEs) 3) Reproducible quantification of interstitial fibrosis and inflammation in renal grafts. Results: 1) We reported an accumulation of HES by RS in renal biopsies from patients exposed to this molecule. Moreover, accumulation of HES in renal graft biopsies exposed to HES was dependent on good quality of graft defined by kidney donor risk index and renal function at 3 months. 2) 4 AGEs were mapped and quantified by RS in diabetic and normal glomeruli. Levels of each AGE were higher diabetic glomeruli vs controls. In diabetic glomeruli, some AGEs were collocated with collagen that was not found in normal glomeruli. 3) Interstitial fibrosis (IF) and inflammation were quantified in 166 renal graft biopsies by an automated FTIR technique. We assessed the robustness of this technique for discrimination of fibrosis and inflammation. We proved the clinical relevance of this technique by showing a good correlation of IF with renal graft function. Conclusion: Vibrational spectroscopy is a promising technique for nephrology both in basic research and in clinical practice.

Synthesis and functionalization of large-area graphene and its structural, electrical and electrochemical properties has been investigated. First, the graphene films, grown by thermal chemical vapor deposition (CVD), contain three to five atomic layers of graphene, as confirmed by Raman spectroscopy and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. Furthermore, the graphene film is treated with CF4 reactive-ion plasma to dope fluorine ions into graphene lattice as confirmed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and UV-photoemission spectroscopy (UPS). Electrochemical characterization reveals that the catalytic activity of graphene for iodine reduction enhanced with increasing plasma treatment time, which is attributed to increase in catalytic sites of graphene for charge transfer. The fluorinated graphene is characterized as a counter-electrode (CE) in a dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) which shows ~ 2.56% photon to electron conversion efficiency with ~11 mAcm−2 current density. Second, the large scale graphene film is covalently functionalized with HNO3 for high efficiency electro-catalytic electrode for DSSC. The XPS and UPS confirm the covalent attachment of C-OH, C(O)OH and NO3- moieties with carbon atoms through sp2-sp3 hybridization and Fermi level shift of graphene occurs under different doping concentrations, respectively. Finally, CoS-implanted graphene (G-CoS) film was prepared using CVD followed by SILAR method. The G-CoS electro-catalytic electrodes are characterized in a DSSC CE and is found to be highly electro-catalytic towards iodine reduction with low charge transfer resistance (Rct ~5.05 Wcm2) and high exchange current density (J0~2.50 mAcm-2). The improved performance compared to the pristine graphene is attributed to the increased number of active catalytic sites of G-CoS and highly conducting path of graphene. We also studied the synthesis and characterization of graphene-carbon nanotube (CNT) hybrid film consisting of graphene supported by vertical CNTs on a Si substrate. The hybrid film is inverted and transferred to flexible substrates for its application in flexible electronics, demonstrating a distinguishable variation of electrical conductivity for both tension and compression. Furthermore, both turn-on field and total emission current was found to depend strongly on the bending radius of the film and were found to vary in ranges of 0.8 – 3.1 V/μm and 4.2 – 0.4 mA, respectively.

Orientador: René Alfonso Nome Silva / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Química / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-27T06:54:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dantas_WillianFranciscoCordeiro_M.pdf: 2446830 bytes, checksum: a6ef77a86d65956736e20e7c5e22ff59 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015 / Resumo: A espectroscopia vibracional de femtossegundos da vizinhança é ideal para caracterizar os movimentos moleculares da vizinhança acoplados com o sistema eletrônico captador de luz. No caso dos movimentos nucleares intramoleculares, isto pode ser realizado tanto por infravermelho quanto por Raman, ambos de femtossegundos. No caso de movimentos intermoleculares, a dinâmica de femtossegundos somente pode ser caracterizada com experimento Raman coerente, e, por essa razão, é importante sabermos qual é o comportamento do clorofórmio em um experimento de femtossegundo. Dessa forma, pode-se realizar a comparação entre os dados experimentais e teóricos e concluir se o comportamento observado experimentalmente é o mesmo que o esperado. Este trabalho explora a análise de Franck-Condon para os espectros de emissão do pireno com dependência da temperatura. Assume-se que uma progressão vibrônica de bandas no formato de Lorenzianas pode representar o formato das bandas de emissão do fluoróforo. Consequentemente, é possível obter alguns parâmetros, como a largura de linha das bandas obtidas, as intensidades relativas dos picos observados (valores que são utilizados para encontrar os fatores de Huang-Rhys), a variação do comprimento de onda de emissão com o aumento da temperatura e a área integrada dos espectros / Abstract: The femtosecond vibrational spectroscopy of the neighborhood is ideal to characterize the molecular movements of the neighborhood coupled with the electronics pickup light. In the case of intra-molecular nuclear movements, this can be accomplished either by infrared and Raman both femtosecond. In the case of intermolecular movements, the dynamics of femtosecond can only be characterized with coherent Raman experiment, and so it is important to know the behavior of chloroform in a femtosecond experiment. Thus, it is possible to make a comparison between experimental and theoretical data and conclude that the observed experimentally is the same behavior expected. This work explores the Franck-Condon analysis for the emission spectra of pyrene in dependence on temperature. It is assumed that a vibronic bands in the progression Lorenzianas shape may represent the format of fluorophore emission bands. Consequently, it is possible to obtain some parameters such as the line width of the bands obtained, the relative intensities of the observed peaks (values that are used to find the Huang-Rhys factors), the variation of emission wavelength with increasing temperature and the integrated area of the spectra / Mestrado / Físico-Química / Mestre em Química