In Situ SERS Monitoring of the Plasmon-Driven Catalytic Reaction by Using Single Ag@Au Nanowires as Substrates

Single nanowires (NWs), as a kind of new surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates, have received extensive concern owing to their distinctive properties and distinct advantages. In this contribution, single Ag nanowires (AgNWs) and single Au-coated AgNWs (Ag@AuNWs) were fabricated by the laser-assisted pulling method and the galvanic replacement reaction, respectively. The prepared single Ag@AuNWs show both high SERS activity and catalytic activity through in situ monitoring and assessing the plasmon-driven surface-catalytic reaction of 4-nitrothiophenol (4-NTP) dimerizing to 4,4′-dimercaptoazobenzene and the reduction reaction of 4-NTP to para-aminothiophenol, respectively. It was found that the intensity of the Raman peak was affected greatly by the laser power, and the Raman peak could still be observed at 0.05% power under mild conditions (633 nm wavelength) in this single nanowire system. From the Raman spectrum, the SERS enhancement factor (EF) of 5.4 × 104 can be obtained, and the EF value of 1.3 × 109 can be reached at optimal conditions. Results have shown that single Ag@AuNWs can be utilized as a good platform for SERS applications with high sensitivity, stability, and reproducibility, which will benefit SERS-based research at the single entity level.