Electric field analysis, polarization, excitation wavelength dependence, and novel applications of tip‐enhanced Raman scattering.

Tip‐enhanced Raman scattering (TERS) has received significant interest as a new nano‐vibrational spectroscopy technique, which can be used to obtain site‐specific molecular information. TERS instruments have made remarkable progress, and the application of TERS has been expanding to nanomaterials, liquid samples, biological materials, and electrochemistry. Furthermore, molecular structures with imaging can be explored even at subnanometer resolution. This review consists of two parts: basic studies on the reproducibility of TERS and novel applications of TERS. In the former part, we report the electric field analysis, polarization, and excitation wavelength dependence of TERS. These studies are very important for understanding the characteristic features of TERS. In the latter part, we introduce two examples of TERS applications to nanomaterials, epitaxial graphene, and graphene oxide and two examples of liquid TERS that use chemically modified tips: nanoscale pH measurement and enantiomeric discrimination using TERS. Finally, we discuss the perspective of TERS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]