Silver-coated eggshell membrane as a cost-effective SERS platform for enhanced molecular sensing.

ABSTRACT: Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a surface-sensitive analytical technique that relies heavily on plasmonic substrates to enhance Raman scattering. In this study, we report the fabrication of a cost-effective SERS substrate by thermally evaporating silver (Ag) onto the eggshell membrane (ESM), a low-cost and biologically sourced material, to create substrates with controlled surface morphologies. The silver coating thickness has been varied to optimize the signal enhancement and was evaluated with three different standard Raman active molecules: 4-mercaptobenzoic acid (4-MBA), 4-mercaptophenylboronic acid (4-MPBA), and rhodamine 6G (R6G)- as analytes. The developed substrates exhibited remarkable SERS activity with an Enhancement Factor (EF) of 0.12 ×10⁶ for 4-MBA, 0

SUBMITTER: Swathy Lekshmy VS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12278052 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature