Raman Tensors and their application in structural studies of biological systems

The Raman scattering of a molecule is generated by interactions of its electrons with incident light. The electric vector of the Raman scattered light is related to the electric vector of the incident light through a characteristic Raman tensor. A unique Raman tensor exists for each Raman-active molecular vibrational mode. In the case of biologically important macromolecules Raman tensors have been determined for a few hundred vibrational Raman bands. These include proteins and their amino acid constituents, as well as nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) and their nucleotide constituents. In this review Raman tensors for 39 representative vibrational Raman bands of biological molecules are considered. We present details of the Raman tensor determinations and discuss their application in structural studies of filamentous bacteriophages (fd, Pf1, Pf3 and PH75), fowl feather rachis and eyespots of the protists, Chlamydomonas and Euglena.