Plasma-induced formation of Ag nanodots for ultra-high-enhancement surface-enhanced Raman scattering substrates. Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • We report here plasma-induced formation of Ag nanostructures for surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) applications. An array of uniform Ag patterned structures of 150 nm diameter was first fabricated on a silicon substrate with imprint lithography; then the substrate was further treated with an oxygen plasma to fracture the patterned structures into clusters of smaller, interconnected, closely packed Ag nanoparticles (20-60 nm) and redeposited Ag nanodots ( approximately 10 nm) between the clusters. The substrate thus formed had a uniform ultrahigh SERS enhancement factor (1010) over the entire substrate for 4-mercaptophenol molecules. By comparison, Au patterned structures fabricated with the same method did not undergo such a morphological change after the plasma treatment and showed no enhancement of Raman scattering.

published proceedings

  • Langmuir

author list (cited authors)

  • Li, Z., Tong, W. M., Stickle, W. F., Neiman, D. L., Williams, R. S., Hunter, L. L., ... Brueck, S.

citation count

  • 28

complete list of authors

  • Li, Zhiyong||Tong, William M||Stickle, William F||Neiman, David L||Williams, R Stanley||Hunter, Luke L||Talin, A Alec||Li, D||Brueck, SRJ

publication date

  • April 2007