Fabrication of Stabilized Gold Nanoparticle Oligomers for Surface-Enhanced Spectroscopies.

Various time-resolved spectroscopies that take advantage of surface-enhancement have been developed. Only the most robust substrates can withstand the high-intensity laser pulses used by time-resolved methods. We present a simple and reliable stabilization procedure that uses polyvinyl alcohol for the formation of robust gold nanoparticle oligomers that can withstand different hydration and temperature levels.