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SERS not to be taken for granted in the presence of oxygen
Published
Author(s)
Melek Erol, Yun Han, Scott K. Stanley, Christopher Stafford, Henry Du, Svetlana Sukhishvili
Abstract
In this communication, we report that oxidation of the Ag nanoparticle (Ag NP) surface under ambient conditions has a dramatic effect on the adsorption and SERS detection limit of nitroaromatic molecules in aqueous solutions. We show for the first time that oxidation of the Ag NP surface hinders charge transfer from Ag to the aromatic ring and drastically decreases the detection sensitivity by ∼5 orders of magnitude. We reveal that ultrasensitive SERS detection of nitroaromatic compounds can be achieved when oxidation of the surface-immobilized Ag NPs is inhibited by using argon gas.
Erol, M.
, Han, Y.
, Stanley, S.
, Stafford, C.
, Du, H.
and Sukhishvili, S.
(2009),
SERS not to be taken for granted in the presence of oxygen, Journal of the American Chemical Society
(Accessed October 7, 2025)