Infrared spectroscopy observing universe

The application of IR spectroscopy to catalysis and surface chemistry was later developed in the fifties by Eischens and coworkers at Texaco laboratories (Beacon, New York) in the USA [7] and, almost simultaneously, by Sheppard and Yates at Cambridge University in the UK [8]. Mapes and Eischens published the spectra of ammonia chemisorbed on a silica-alumina cracking catalyst in 1954 [6], showing the presence of Lewis acid sites and also the likely presence of Br0nsted acid sites. Eischens, Francis and Pliskin published the IR spectra of carbon monoxide adsorbed on nickel and its oxide in 1956 [9]. Later they presented the results of an IR study of the catalyzed oxidation of CO on nickel at the First International Congress on Catalysis, held in Philadelphia in 1956 [10]. Eischens and Pliskin also published a quite extensive review on the subject of Infrared spectra of adsorbed molecules in Advances in Catalysis in 1958, where data on hydrocarbons, CO, ammonia and water adsorbed on metals, oxides and minerals were reviewed [11]. These papers evidence clearly the two tendencies observed in subsequent spectroscopic research in the field of catalysis. They are the use of probes to test the surface chemistry of solids and the use of spectroscopy to reveal the mechanism of the surface reactions. They used an in situ cell where the catalyst sample was... 

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