Synthesis of Flower-like Silver Nanostructures on Silicon and Their Application in Surface-enhanced Raman Scattering

Abstract

To enhance the intensity of surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS), production of metal nanostructures with sharp points, lying side by side at the nanometer level plays an extremely important role. In this paper, we report on a manufacturing process in which the silver nanoparticles with the flower-like shape have been fabricated. Such silver nanoparticles have been fabricated by chemical deposition of silver particles on silicon wafers, using a solution of hydrofluoric acid (HF), silver nitrate (AgNO₃) and ascorbic acid (AsA) in water, at room temperature. During the manufacturing we found that only when the concentrations of AgNO₃ and AsA are appropriate, the flower-like silver nanoparticles will form. Note that while other authors mainly made flower-like silver nanoparticles in the form of suspensions, we have created flower-like silver nanoparticles with cabbage-shape on a silicon surface. The ensembles of flower-like silver nanoparticles above were used as SERS substrates to detect crystal violet (CV) in low concentrations and good results were obtained.