A facile approach for growing Ag nano-dendrites employing towards E. coli cells monitoring using SERS: a proof-of-concept study

Here, a highly efficient and inexpensive technique to fabricate silver dendritic nanostructures with unique numerous lateral branches has been demonstrated. The study utilized the metal-assisted growth (MAG) technique, which is a simple, one-step technique that allows exact control over the size and morphology of the generated dendrites. The prepared dendrites are characterized using various techniques and the fabrication mechanism is well explored. The final synthesized Ag dendrites are then utilized to detect in-house cultured E. coli. cells using surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) activity. The proposed reason for their superior SERS performance is due to the contribution from the large amount of plasmon-active ‘hotspots’ present in dendritic structures at the sharp edges enhancing the nearby local electromagnetic fields. The proposed work suggests Ag dendritic nanostructures as a potential candidate for SERS-based applications.