A study on the spectral characteristics of surface enhanced Raman scattering based on far-Field extinction and near-field electromagnetic field intensity of 2D nanostructures

A new solid-state electrochemical patterning technique was applied to fabrication of high-resolution silver bowtie antennas and hexagonal arrays. These silver nanofeatures were used to investigate the relation among surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) enhancement factor (EF), extinction, local electromagnetic (EM) fieldmaxima of the features. It is found that spectral extinction property or the plasmonic resonance of a given SERS substrate alone is not sufficient for determining optimal EF; the number of points of high local EMfield, or 'hot spots', and the distribution of those high-field spots, too, play a role.