| AVS 55th International Symposium & Exhibition | |
| Advanced Surface Engineering | Thursday Sessions |
| Session SE+TF+NC-ThA |
| Session: | Glancing Angle Deposition (GLAD) II |
| Presenter: | Y. Liu, University of Georgia |
| Authors: | Y. Liu, University of Georgia Z. Zhang, University of Georgia Y. Zhao, University of Georgia |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
Surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) is widely used in the analytical, biomedical, clinical, environmental, and security applications. The practical application of a SERS-based sensor requires an efficiency SERS substrate which can not only provide a high enhancement factor, but also be uniform, stable and reproducible. In this work, a highly ordered, uniform and periodic patterned Ag nanorod arrays as SERS substrates are fabricated by combining electron beam lithography (EBL) and oblique angle deposition (OAD) techniques. Two dimensional nano Au post arrays with different separations are fabricated by EBL. There are only very weak SERS signal can be detected after the Au post arrays are treated by a 1 μL 10-4 M BPE (trans-1,2-bis (4-pyridyl) ethene) droplet. However, after a layer of ~ 400 nm Ag nanorods are deposited on those BPE treated Au post array, strong SERS signals have been obtained. Furthermore, the SERS intensities become more than 8 times stronger, after the Ag arrays are further treated by a droplet of 1μL 10-5 M BPE. These results demonstrate that most SERS signals could come from the molecules adsorbed on the side surfaces of the Ag nanorods, rather than the ends. The SERS signal is also strongly dependent on the separation of the Au posts. A numerical calculation on the electric field enhancement has been carried out to confirm this result.