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Broad and low‐intensity Raman peaks are usually expected from nanocrystalline thin semiconductor films. The inherently weak Raman scattering phenomenon can be further deteriorated by unwanted background signals preventing the successful Raman analysis of an analyte. In this study, the resonant and surface‐enhanced Raman scattering techniques were combined to detect CuO and Cu2O phases in the partially oxidized nanocrystalline copper film that were otherwise undetectable. Heat treatment resulted in increased oxidation and phase transition from multiphase to single CuO phase that was in situ observed by temperature‐dependent Raman measurements. Detailed understanding of the film properties and substrate interaction was made by using several characterization techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resonant Raman scattering is highly desired for material study. It is experimentally not easy to reach the resonant scattering interaction between an incident photon and a material due to the limited available laser wavelengths. In this study, by employing silver plasmonic nanoparticles deposited on glass substrate and by in situ adjusting the cadmium sulfide (CdS) band gap through heat treatment, resonant Raman scattering condition (laser wavelength of 514.5 nm) was fully achieved in nanocrystalline CdS thin films. The dramatically enhanced Raman scattering allowed us to in situ monitor the phase transition that occurred during the heat treatment and to quantitatively characterize the fraction of the zincblende (cubic) CdS in the main base of wurtzite (hexagonal) CdS. Raman multi-phonon and the corresponding high-order scattering modes were observed due to the much enhanced surface nanoplasmonic electric field. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]