Nanostructured Silver Substrates With Stable and Universal SERS Properties: Application to Organic Molecules and Semiconductor Nanoparticles

Nanostructured silver films have been prepared by thermal deposition on silicon, and their properties as SERS substrates investigated. The optimal conditions of the post-growth annealing of the substrates were established. Atomic force microscopy study revealed that the silver films with relatively dense and homogeneous arrays of 60–80-nm high pyramidal nanoislands are the most efficient for SERS of both organic dye and inorganic nanoparticles analytes. The noticeable enhancement of the Raman signal from colloidal nanoparticles with the help of silver island films is reported for the first time

A Model of Surface Misorientation Occurring During MBE of GaAs:Be

ABSTRACTAn impurity adsorption model is proposed accounting for a distortion of the surface morphology of GaAs:Be epitaxial layers and an emergence of misoriented facets. According to the model, the morphology distortion occurs as the surface sublimation energy of the growing face drops down to zero because of adsorption of Be atoms at the layer surface. The model is in good agreement with available experimental data on the surface morphology distortion of GaAs:Be layers grown by MBE.</jats:p