Anisotropic growth of photoreduced silver nanostructures using surfactant-assisted ferroelectric templates for surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy

Abstract

Photoreduction using ferroelectric templates is an emerging green technique for the production of noble-metal nanostructures by a reductant-free process. In this work, anisotropic growth of silver nanostructures is stimulated by a surfactant-assisted photoreduction process on ferroelectric templates. The preferential adsorption of surfactant (polyvinylpyrrolidone) on the specific facets of silver creates the anisotropic growth of nanostructures and thus the formation of silver nanoplates. The surfactant adsorption effects on the nanoparticle morphology and the nanoparticle properties are studied. Their influence levels depend on the ratio of surfactant concentration to precursor concentration. The produced silver nanostructures have superior SERS features, such as the limit of detection of <10−8 M, the enhancement factor of 2.2 × 109 and Raman intensity enhancement by 8.71 times. The study of anisotropic growth of photoreduced nanoparticles using ferroelectric templates provides a promising prospect to develop green production techniques for versatile anisotropic nanoparticles.