Molecular fiber sensors based on surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS).

Molecular sensors based on surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) and optical fibers have been widely used in biological, environmental and chemical detection procedures due to their unique advantages, such as molecular specificity, high sensitivity and flexibility. In this paper, we review the development and highlight some of the important milestones of SERS fiber sensor development with emphasis on recent work to improve the sensitivity of the fiber sensors. In particular in the area to increase the sensitivity, we've reviewed various methods of sample preparation as well as different fiber SERS sensors.

Manipulation and light-induced agglomeration of carbon nanotubes through optical trapping of attached silver nanoparticles.

A simple experimental method has been demonstrated for manipulating multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) bundles through the optical trapping of attached silver nanoparticles (SNPs). In our experiments, without the SNPs, the MWCNTs cannot be trapped due to their irregular shapes and large aspect ratio. However, when mixed with SNPs, the MWCNTs can be successfully trapped along with the SNPs using a TEM(00) mode laser at 532 nm.

Competitive binding effects on surface-enhanced Raman scattering of peptide molecules.

Surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) has been conducted on tryptophan (W), proline (P) and tyrosine (Y) containing peptides that include W-P-Y, Y-P-W, W-P-P-P-Y, Y-P-P-P-W, W-P-P-P-P-P-Y, and Y-P-P-P-P-P-W to gain insight into molecular binding behavior on a metal substrate to eventually apply in protein SERS detection. The peptides are shown to bind through the molecule's carboxylic end, but the strong affinity of the tryptophan residue to the substrate surface, in conjunction with its large polarizability, dominates each molecule's SERS signal with the strong presence of its ring modes in all samples. These results are important for understanding SERS of protein molecules.

Effects of chromophore orientation and molecule conformation on surface-enhanced Raman scattering studied with alkanoic acids and colloidal silver nanoparticles.

Experimental studies have been carried out to gain a better understanding of the effects of chromophore orientation and molecular conformation on surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) based on metal nanostructures. A series of alkanoic acids that contain a phenyl ring separated by methylene groups from the carboxylic acid, including phenylacetic acid, 3-phenylpropionic acid, 4-phenylbutyric acid, 5-phenylvaleric acid, and 6-phenylhexanoic acid, was investigated as model molecules with colloidal silver nanoparticles as SERS substrates. As the number of methylene groups increases, the molecules display an interesting zigzag intensity pattern of the phenyl ring bending mode around 1000 cm(-1) as well as a trend of appearance and disappearance of either the degenerate ring breathing mode or C[Double Bond]O vibrational mode near 1585 and 1630 cm(-1), respectively.

Surface-enhanced Raman scattering detection of lysophosphatidic acid.

Surface-enhanced Raman scattering using silver nanoparticles was applied to detect various forms of lysophosphatidic acid (LPA) to examine its potential application as an alternative to current detection methods of LPA as biomarkers of ovarian cancer. Enhancement of the Raman modes of the molecule, especially those related to the acyl chain within the 800-1300 cm(-1) region, was observed. In particular, the C-C vibration mode of the gauche-bonded chain around 1100 cm(-1) was enhanced to allow the discrimination of two similar LPA molecules.