Fabrication of gold nanoparticle-coated paper and its use as a sensitive substrate for quantitative SERS analysis

Utilization of Inexpensive Carbon-Based Substrates as Platforms for Sensing

“…Although the preparation of these materials is simple, such approaches do not yield reliable outcomes. The SERS performance has been found to be inconsistent and thus not suitable for non-aqueous applications [ 16 , 17 ]. Other types of SERS materials have rough surfaces [ 18 ].…”

“…To improve the usability of materials, with varying morphologies, in SERS detection flexible substrates have been explored including filter paper [ 16 , 17 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 ], adhesive tape [ 40 ], cotton [ 4 , 41 ], carbon cloth [ 42 ], polymer nanofibers [ 43 ], polymer nanotubes [ 44 ], and electrospun poly(vinyl alcohol) nanofibers [ 35 , 45 ]. The fabrication techniques used for such flexible substrates include ink-jet printing [ 34 , 39 ], dip coating [ 17 , 35 ], templating [ 16 ], drop casting [ 40 ], and electroless deposition [ 38 , 42 ]. Although some of these methods are simple, they require long preparation time or dry time (12–48 h), large material use, special equipment and trained personnel.…”

Microfluidics-Driven Fabrication of a Low Cost and Ultrasensitive SERS-Based Paper Biosensor

“…In this way, the amount of NPs needed for the fabrication of this SERS substrate is considerably lower than the volume needed with previous dip-coating approaches [37,38] or with the silver mirror reaction method, which is usually no less than 10 mL [23,39]. The active area of the assembly was that of the reservoir design, 32.88 mm 2 ( Figure 3A), and, thus, the active area for sensing can be extended when compared to previous approaches [40]. The surface coverage for the GNSs and NRs sensors were 0.6 mM mm −2 and 0.3 mM mm −2 , respectively.…”

“…Despite the very low volume of NPs needed for the assembly, the naked-eye assessment of the homogeneity ( Figure 3B) of the deposition and concentration of NPs was comparable to alternative strategies. For example, Villa et al [40] reported on the fabrication of a gold nanoparticle array on paper by drop-casting using different NP concentrations. In order to achieve a close packed NP arrangement, they needed to use a 50-fold pre-concentrated NPs solution of the well-known Turkevich [41] gold NPs.…”

ZnO Tips Dotted with Au Nanoparticles—Advanced SERS Determination of Trace Nicotine

“…In recent years, surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) spectroscopy for onsite detection applications has aroused attention [ 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 ] because of its high Raman signal enhancement and the fast development of portable Raman systems. Especially, some stable SERS materials for the detection of nicotine have been reported, such as thiol-terminated molecular imprint microspheres [ 34 ], colloids [ 35 , 36 , 37 ], and Au-nanoparticle-coated paper [ 38 ] but the sample pretreatment process is still complicated. We reported that the gold-dotted magnetic composite was prepared and used to detect nicotine in saliva by using a magnetically optimized SERS strategy, but the quantitatively analytic performance needs further improvement [ 39 ].…”