Chemical composition and structural porosity are two critical components in fabricating active substrates for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS).  Control of these significant factors can result in an increase in Raman hot spots, ultimately enhancing the SERS signals.  In this work, highly porous gold-silver bimetallic nanowires were manufactured by a simple galvanic replacement reaction.  A systematic study using microscopic and spectroscopic tools was employed in characterizing these porous bimetallic nanowires.  We were able to observe an increase in surface roughness, nanowire diameter, and SERS activity, as well as newly formed nano-sized gaps, on the gold-silver bimetallic nanowires.  We have demonstrated that galvanic replacement is an efficient method to fabricate highly sensitive porous SERS substrates, in which the isolated porous bimetallic nanowires were produced with ultrasensitive chemical detection of probe molecules.

Porous bimetallic nanowires for high performance SERS

244th National Meeting (2012)

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