Template grown materials for nanoscal spectroscopy

Research project P 14386 Template grown materials for nanoscale spectroscopy Dr. H. KUZMANY 08.05.2000 In this research Project we win perform spectroscopic investigations of template grown nanomaterial down to a very high spatial resolution. The spectroscopic techniques to be applied will be Raman scattering and `R absorption- The high resolution will be achieved by applying surface enhanced -resonance scattering (SERS) and a synchrotron beam line in the case of Raman spectroscopy and IR spectroscopy, respectively. SERS experiments allow in particular to achieve an enhancement Of the scattering cross section by several orders of magnitude which allows a reduction of the scattering volume to several molecules. For the application of this technique one needs nanostructured metallic substrates. The templates to be used will either be fullerenic precurser material in the form of nanorods and vesicles or bacterial S-layers and inverse opals. The nanorods will be transformed to new phases, possibly with high conductivity or even superconductivity The template grown layers win be us, as corrugated metallic substrate for the SERS experiments. In addition to the nanorods also carbon nanotubes and fullerene Polymers will be investigated, Possibly down to a molecular level. Structural characterization of the as grown and of the transformed nanomaterial will be carried out by scanning atomic force and scanning tunneling microscopy. The project will be carried out in cooperation with several partners from Austrian and from international research instituts. The partners will basically provide the precursers in the form of nanorods and the raw material for the corrugated substrates. Goal of the project is to grow and manipulate on the one side carbon nanomaterial On the other side techniques which allow spectroscopy from individual nanoparticles and, eventually, also from single molecules.