Highly sensitive detection of paclitaxel by surface-enhanced Raman scattering

The surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) technique was shown to be an effective molecular analytical tool due to its high sensitivity. Here, we propose to exploit soft UV assisted nanoimprint lithography (UV-NIL) for the development of a reproducible and highly-sensitive SERS biosensor. Soft lithography is known to be advantageous for biological applications since it is compatible with insulating supports and large-area samples. In the present investigations, soft UV-NIL is used for the fabrication of large-sized arrays of gold nanocylinders on glass which were shown to be highly sensitive and highly specific sensing surfaces, with a limit of detection measured down to 1 nM. Employing the UV-NIL SERS substrate enable working ranges of nanomolar to micromolar concentrations in regards to our model paclitaxel analyte.