Three-dimensional nanostructured metallic substrates for enhanced vibrational spectroscopy are fabricated by self-assembly. Nanostructures consisting of one to 20 depositions of 13 nm-diameter Au nanoparticles (NPs) on Au films are prepared and characterized by means of AFM and UV/Vis reflection-absorption spectroscopy. Surface-enhanced polarization modulation infrared reflection-absorption spe...

The rapid development of near-infrared surface-enhanced Raman scattering (NIR SERS) imaging technology has attracted strong interest from scientists and clinicians due to its narrow spectral bandwidth, low background interference, and deep imaging depth. In this report, the graphene oxide (GO)-wrapped gold nanorods (GO@GNRs) were developed as a smart and robust nanoplatform for ultrafast NIR SE...

Localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) is strongly associated with inelastic scattering of biochemical molecules near metal nanostructures, i.e., surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS). Systematically exploration of the relationship between surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) and the plasmon resonance wavelength has been an experimental limitation due to the lack of reliable and tu...

Near-infrared surface-enhanced Raman scattering (NIR SERS) imaging is now a promising molecular imaging technology due to its narrow spectral bandwidth, low background interference and deep imaging depth. In this work, we report a novel strategy for fabrication of NIR SERS nanoprobes without using any expensive and highly toxic organic dyes. Multifunctional conducting polymer (CP) materials, se...

While top-down substrates for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) offer outstanding control and reproducibility of the gold nanopatterns and their related localized surface plasmon resonance, intracellular SERS experiments heavily rely on gold nanoparticles. These nanoparticles often result in varying and uncontrollable enhancement factors. Here we demonstrate the use of top-down gold-na...

The use of porous polymer monoliths functionalized with silver nanoparticles is introduced in this work for high-sensitivity surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) detection. Preparation of the SERS detection elements is a simple process comprising the synthesis of a discrete polymer monolith section within a silica capillary, followed by physically trapping silver nanoparticle aggregates wit...

Rapid and accurate diagnosis for pathogens and their antibiotic susceptibility is critical for controlling bacterial infections. Conventional methods for determining bacterium's sensitivity to antibiotic depend mostly on measuring the change of microbial proliferation in response to the drug. Such "biological assay" inevitably takes time, ranging from days for fast-growing bacteria to weeks for...

We report a facile method to synthesise flexible 3D surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates, using poly-m-phenylenediamine/polyacrylonitrile (PmPD/PAN) nanofiber mats as templates to self-assemble citrate-stabilized Ag nanocrystals (AgNCs), such as Ag nanoparticles (AgNPs), Ag nanotriangles (AgNTs) or Ag nanodisks (AgNDs). The SERS performances of AgNC@2D and AgNC@3D substrates were...

The spatial and temporal variation of local field enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) at Ag nanowires (NWs) in aqueous solution is presented for an improved understanding of the NW structure-SERS enhancement capability relationship. Crossed Ag NWs and Ag NW bundles are found to have SERS enhancement factors much higher than single Ag NWs because of the higher density of interstitials formed by str...

High-temperature surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) sensing is significant for practical detections, and pinhole-containing (PC) metal@oxide structures possessing both enhanced thermal stability and superior SERS sensitivity are served as promising SERS sensors at extreme sensing conditions. Through tuning the Al2O3 precursors' exposure time during atomic layer deposition (ALD), Al2O3 she...