This is a small project funded by the EPSRC C-DIP Programme to promote a cross-disciplinary research in the emerging research area of Bio-Nano-Electromagnetics at the University of Bristol (UoB).  

This interdisciplinary Bio-Nano-Electromagnetic project brings together currently unrelated research efforts at UoB in the fields of electromagnetics, physics, photonics and nanotechnology. We strongly believe that progress in research in medicine, physics and engineering requires ever-stronger inter-disciplinary collaborations between researchers in different faculties. In this project we have identified several exciting applications which shall benefit from this initiative.

One of the projects we are working on is devoted to improving SERS (surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy) by using nanoantennas. It has been shown that Raman spectroscopy is able to distinguish between cancerous and healthy tissue in the laboratory. SERS exploits the locally enhanced electric field on rough metal surfaces to drastically improve Raman scattering process. In our approach, instead of relying on “random” field enhancements produced by rough metal surfaces we want to achieve controllable and very high field enhancements by using arrays of nanoantennas (optical antennas). Nanoantennas exhibiting plasmonic resonances can enhance the field leading to SERS signal enhancement1 that is approximately proportional to the fourth power of the field enhancement factor.

Figure. Metalic dipole nanoantennas. Simulation results (on a left) and fabricated samples using Focused Ian Beam (on a right).

E.J. Smythe et al, Optical antenna arrays on a fiber facet for in situ surface-enhanced Raman scattering detection, Nano Letters 9, 1132 (2009)