Optimizing and improving the growth of Ag nanoparticles decorated on the silicon pyramid for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy

Abstract

This study demonstrates a simple method to fabricate the silicon pyramid on the silicon substrate via a chemical etching method. The chemical etching process with different reaction conditions plays an essential role in controlling the growth of uniform and large silicon pyramids. The silicon pyramid can provide suitable geometric structures to deposit silver nanoparticles with better anti-aggregation stability to apply surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) substrates via the ion-sputtering method. The appropriate silicon pyramid and silver nanoparticles sizes were optimized to produce the most significant SERS effect in the rhodamine 6G molecule. The silicon pyramid exhibited better morphology for the deposition of uniform-sized silver nanoparticles, facilitating the fabrication of high-performance SERS substrate to detect different drugs. The fabrication of silver nanoparticles decorated on the silicon pyramid is facile, of high reproducibility, which shall be advantageous in applications for detecting other molecules via SERS.