Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy Using Facile NanoPlasmonic Devices

拉曼光谱是一种用于测量化学混合物组成的强大光学技术。每种类型的分子都有一个独特的颜色“指纹”，当化学样品被低功率激光照射时就会出现。尽管拉曼分析具有很高的精度，但它常常受到拉曼信号固有的微弱性的限制。Tornado光谱系统公司（多伦多，ON）发明了一种新型的光谱仪（颜色测量装置），它克服了许多情况下的微弱性问题，但仍然不能对各种类型的化学混合物进行质量测量。这些限制可以通过使用多伦多大学发现的专门的纳米光子/纳米等离子体光学放大装置来克服。这些光放大器可以集中和加强其表面的纳米尺度区域内的光，从而增强这些区域附近的光与物质的相互作用。这种光学放大器设备可以显着提高拉曼指纹信号的强度，因此即使在最困难的条件下也可以精确测量化学浓度。本项目的目的是通过实验证明这些新型纳米等离子体器件的可行性，以提高检测灵敏度，从而将其集成到Tornado的拉曼光谱仪中。

Raman spectroscopy is a powerful optical technique for measuring the composition of chemical mixtures. Eachtype of molecule has a unique colour "fingerprint" which appears when the chemical sample is illuminated bylow-power laser light. Although highly precise, Raman analysis is often limited by the inherent faintness of theRaman signal.Tornado Spectral Systems (Toronto, ON) has invented a new type of spectrometer (colour measurementdevice) which overcomes the faintness problem in many cases, but which is still unable to make qualitymeasurements of various types of chemical mixtures. These limitations can be overcome by using specializednanophotonic/nanoplasmonic optical amplification devices discovered at the University of Toronto. Theseoptical amplifiers can concentrate and intensify light within the nanoscale domains of its surface and henceenhance the light-matter interaction in close proximity of these domains. Such optical amplifier devices cansignificantly boost the strength of the Raman fingerprint signal and hence enable accurate measurements ofchemical concentrations even under the most difficult conditions.The objective of this project is to experimentally demonstrate the viability of these novel nanoplasmonicdevices for enhanced detection sensitivity and hence its integration in Tornado's Raman Spectrometer.