SERS—A Useful Tool

It is appropriate to begin this last section by quoting Furtak, in one of the early SERS papers The long sought for experimental tool for detailed chemical characterization of the solid-aqueous electrolyte interface may have at last been found. This was the general feeling or at least the general wish. Has it been realized What does the future hold for it  

As was shown in this review, the major effort in SERS studies was directed toward understanding this phenomenon, and generally not toward its application and utilization. Nevertheless, some very interesting information was acquired along the way, regarding interfaces and molecules at interfaces, as can be seen from the reports reviewed through this review. An increasing number of studies is carried out now to use SERS as a tool and the proportion can be expected to increase further. 

In this section a brief summary of representative studies, which have used SERS for surface studies, is given. 

SERS is not the only method to apply Raman techniques to surfaces. There are several other ways of increasing the sensitivity of the Raman technique, and all work together to offer a versatile and powerful instrument. Nowadays, Raman measurements can be performed with the high sensitivity of OMA techniques, which pose no special restrictions on the systems investigated (no specific metal or surface preparation).  

Such surfaces can exhibit enhancements up to two orders of magnitude. Also ATR configurations can be used on a variety of sur-faces. Interference techniques can be applied as well as waveguide techniques in 100-nm films. New geometries for surface enhancement were suggested, for instance by Aravind et 

---