Surface Enhanced Raman Detection of CW Agents in Water Using Gold Sol-Gel Substrates

摘要

The development of a water analysis system capable of detecting both inanimate trace chemical contaminants and viable microbial contaminants has long been a project of interest to our group. The capability of detecting both chemical and biological agent sources in a single device configuration would clearly add to the value of such a product. In the present work, we describe results with chemical warfare agents from our efforts to produce a Raman system for the detection of both chemical and biological warfare agents in water. We utilize laser Raman light scattering and employ Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS) on solid state gold sol-gel detectors combined with fiber optic collection of the enhanced light signal in the sampling system to augment the normally low intensity Raman Scattering signal from trace materials.