title: Large-area, lithography-free, low-cost SERS sensor with good flexibility and high performance.
abstract: Cost-effective, sensitive and bio-compatible surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) substrate has been in high demand since the Raman spectrum was designated as a significant tool for analyzing the composition of liquids, gases and solids in 1998 [1]. In this research, we presented the design, fabrication and characterization of an improved gold-based SERS substrate. With fine tuning of the SiO2 thickness we achieved a 3.391 times improvement and achieved an enhancement factor of 1.55 * 10(7) which is 15 times better than the current gold-standard Klarite substrate. Such improvement is ascribed to the localized surface plasmon resonance (SPR) and propagating SPR, which is proved by full-wave finite-difference time-domain simulations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA.
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.forename: Zhida
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Abid
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ameen
authors.forename: Fei
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Ding
authors.forename: Guohong
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.forename: Gang Logan
authors.initials: GL
authors.lastname: Liu