Development of silver/gold nanocages onto indium tin oxide glass as a reagentless plasmonic mercury sensor

We demonstrate the utilization of silver/gold nanocages (Ag/Au NCs) deposited onto transparent indium tin oxide (ITO) film glass as the basis of a reagentless, simple and inexpensive mercury probe. The localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) peak wavelength was located at ∼800 nm. By utilizing the redox reaction between Hg(2+) ions and Ag atoms that existed in Ag/Au NCs, the LSPR peak of Ag/Au NCs was blue-shifted. Thus, we develop an optical sensing probe for the detection of Hg(2+) ions. The LSPR peak changes were lineally proportional to the concentration of Hg(2+) ions over the range from 10 ppb to 0.5 ppm. The detection limit was ∼5 ppb. This plasmonic probe shows good selectivity and high sensitivity. The proposed optical probe is successfully applied to the sensing of Hg(2+) in real samples.