Investigation on SERS of different phase structure TiO2 nanoparticles

In this paper, anatase and rutile TiO2 nanoparticles as well as their mixed crystal phase structure TiO2 nanoparticles were synthesized by a sol-hydrothermal method, and were served as active substrates for surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) study. The results show that the 4-mercaptobenzoic acid probe molecules exhibit different degree SERS enhancements on the surface of different phase structure TiO2 nanoparticles. The mixed crystal structure TiO2 with an appropriate proportion of anatase and rutile phase is favourable to SERS enhancement of adsorbed molecules. These are mainly attributed to the contributions of the TiO2-to-molecule charge transfer mechanism and the mixed crystal effect. Copyright (c) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.