In this paper, nanostructured materials based both on silica and silicon, are studied in order to obtain new materials with both large Raman gain coefficients and spectral bandwidth. In particular, silica-niobia based glasses have been characterized by linear Raman spectroscopy, while amorphous silicon nanoparticles and in silicon micro- and nano-crystals have been characterized by Stimulated Raman Scattering spectroscopy. Finally, results are discussed.