Confocal Surface-Enhanced Raman Microscopy at the Surface of Noble Metals

The optical and spectroscopic properties of nanoparticles are of interest for a wide variety of methodic and technical fields of applications. The investigation of nanoparticles requires convincing characterization methods with high spatial resolution. The surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy is a sensitive tool for characterizing the chemical structure of metal nanoparticles like gold, silver, or copper. If combined with local confocal microscopy it becomes a method for delivering optical and geometrical information of nanosize metallic structures. This method is called confocal surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopic (SERS) microscopy. The fundamentals and significance of confocal SERS microscopy are described based on literature data and recent results of own studies.