Attaining semi-quantitative SERS measurements on thermally dewetted Au films

Abstract

The current work attempts to provide a proof of concept for the achievement of semi-quantitative measurements by applying Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering (SERS) on thermally dewetted Au-films. In order to probe the anticipated advanced (device) material, Mitoxantrone (MTX) that exhibits strong SERS signal was utilized as a relevant prototype active molecular agent. The molecule was deposited on substrates of different morphology by spin coating and after evaluation of the collected SERS spectra it is shown that there is an almost linear correlation between the SERS intensity and the concentration of the SERS active molecule. In addition the enhancements achieved depend on the substrate's morphology.

Thermal dewetting tunes surface enhanced resonance Raman scattering (SERRS) performance

“…In principle, the greater the values for nominal thickness, annealing temperature and duration, the larger the nanostructures formed. The aforementioned parameters enable the production of user-manipulated, reproducible substrates with well controlled particle size distributions 21 (see also Table 1 ).…”

“…An almost linear behavior has already been shown to persist roughly up to the concentrations of 10 μg ml −1 . 21 Considerably large error bars associated with the measurements may be explained by the small ensemble of Au-islands sampled when using the 50× objective. The absolute quantity of MTX that is actually deposited on the plasmonic surface after the respective droplet has been spin coated on the substrate will allow quantitative measurements to be attained.…”