Green synthesis of asymmetrically textured silver meso-flowers (AgMFs) as highly sensitive SERS substrates

Highly asymmetrical "flower-like" micron silver particles, so-called hierarchical silver meso-flowers (AgMFs), were facilely synthesized using ascorbic acid at room temperature in the presence of chitosan biopolymer. The time-evolution of TEM images and XRD analysis confirmed the anisotropic growth of AgMFs with single crystalline phase of which the formation mechanism was described in detail. The morphology and size of as-prepared AgMFs were tunable simply by changing the concentration of chitosan biopolymer and/or AgNO3 precursor under otherwise identical conditions. The asymmetrically textured AgMFs dramatically enhanced Raman signals of probe molecules (2-chlorothiophenol, 4-aminothiophenol) even at a single particle level because of their surface morphologies consisting of numerous nanoedges and crevices.