Hierarchical structures of surface-accessible plasmonic gold and silver nanoparticles for SERS detection.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a highly sensitive analytical technique with excellent molecular specificity. However, separate pristine nanoparticles produce relatively weak Raman signals. It is necessary to focus on increasing the "hot-spot" density generated at the nanogaps between the adjacent nanoparticles (second-generation SERS hotspot), thus significantly boosting the Raman signal by creating an electromagnetic field.

Modified hydrothermal method for synthesizing titanium dioxide-decorated multiwalled carbon nanotube nanocomposites for the solar-driven photocatalytic degradation of dyes.

This study aimed to address the issue of rapid electron-hole recombination in photocatalysis by exploiting multi-phase TiO decorated on multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) to improve the photocatalytic degradation of dyes. A simple and eco-friendly one-pot method was utilized to create the TiO/MWCNT nanostructure using glucose as both a structure-directing agent and a carbon source without requiring any prior covalent or non-covalent functionalization of the MWCNTs at 160 °C. Furthermore, it was found that the average width of the nanocomposites changed from 20 ± 1 and 42 ± 2 nm to 56 ± 3 nm, corresponding to MWCNT contents of 1.