1932-4510/14©2014IEEE SEPTEMBER 2014 | IEEE NANOTECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE | 29 S CIRCLE—©CAN STOCK PHOTO/KEVDRAWS CHING-HSIANG CHEN, WEI-NIEN SU, SUNNY HY, CHUN-JERN PAN, MEN-CHE TSAI, JOHN RICK, AND BING-JOE HWANG Raman Scattering Surface Signal Enhancement SURFACE-ENHANCED RAMAN scattering (SERS) is a powerful technique that has been widely applied in differ- ent fields to identify molecular structures and characterize atomic interactions. In this article, we introduce the theory and instrumentation relevant to SERS induced by silicon dioxide (SiO 2 )-coated shell iso- lated gold nanoparticles (Au@SiO 2 ) core– shell nanoclusters (NCs) and nanorods (NRs). We explain the synthetic meth- ods used to generate Au@SiO 2 core–shell NCs and NRs and show how they can be manipulated for SERS applications, including their use in biosensors that are able to quantitatively analyze small molecules and their roles in the struc- tural identification of amorphous ultrathin solid-state film materials and in elucidat- ing the interphase reactions between the electrode and electrolyte in lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries. Our findings support the view that SERS techniques, used in conjunction with metallic NCs or NRs, can reduce the detection limits for tar- get molecules and are, thus, applicable to future studies of nanoscale materials. INTRODUCTION TO RAMAN SCATTERING TECHNOLOGY Vibrational spectroscopy has been used extensively in the chemical and materi- als sciences to study gaseous, liquid, and solid materials. This technique generally provides more and better-resolved bands containing more information than ultra- violet and near-infrared electronic spec- troscopy. Compared with electron energy Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MNANO.2014.2327252 Date of publication: 11 July 2014 Induced by Au@SiO 2 core-shell nanoclusters and nanorods.