This study describes the beginning stages of discovering, fabricating, and optimizing the pore size of gold plated filters as highly enhancing surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates. Polycarbonate track etched filter membranes are first plated with a thin layer of gold via electroless deposition. Next, a Raman reporter molecule, 4-nitrobenzenethiol (NBT), is adsorbed onto the gold filters and utilized as a model compound to assess the SERS activity. It is well established that SERS enhancement is dependent on the nanomorphology of the substrate. Thus, systematic variation of filter pore size and gold plating time will be investigated as a means to systematically and reproducibly control filter morphology. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) is utilized to analyze the pore sizes after gold plating, i.e., nanomorphology, and correlate to the SERS intensity. Preliminary results suggest filters with a nominal pore size of 200 nm provide the maximum SERS enhancement. Additional studies to evaluate heterogeneity of the SERS signal across the filter surface and establish a detection limit are planned.

Studies of opimization of pore size for gold plated filters as highly enhancing surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates

248th National Meeting (2014)

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