Surface-enhanced vibrational spectroscopies in electrocatalysis: Fundamentals, challenges, and perspectives

Electrocatalysis offers a promising approach towards chemical synthesis driven by renewable energy. Molecular level understanding of the electrochemical interface remains challenging due to its compositional and structural complexity. In situ interfacial specific characterization techniques could help uncover structure-function relationships and reaction mechanism. To this end, electrochemical surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) and surface-enhanced infrared absorption spectroscopy (SEIRAS) thrive as powerful techniques to provide fingerprint information of interfacial species at reaction conditions. In this review, we first introduce the fundamentals of SERS and SEIRAS, followed by discussion regarding the technical challenges and potential solutions. Finally, we highlight future directions for further development of surface-enhanced spectroscopic techniques for electrocatalytic studies. This review emphasizes challenges in applying surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) and surface-enhanced infrared absorption spectroscopy (SEIRAS) and future directions to further unlock their potential in electrocatalytic research.