Hot spots in highly Raman-enhancing silver nano-dendrites

A convenient strategy is demonstrated for placing C60 nanoclusters in hot spots between neighbouring arms of silver nano-dendrites leading to intense surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) enhancement. The finite difference time domain calculations indicate that the dendrite-like model pattern may demonstrate a high quality SERS property owing to the 'metal/nanoclusters/metal' hot geometries. Further calculations provide useful guidelines for the synthesis of hot dendritic geometries and further increasing the enhancement factor of the SERS.