Graphene-Based Surface Enhanced Vibrational Spectroscopy: Recent Developments, Challenges, and Applications

Surface-enhanced vibrational spectroscopies, including surface-enhanced infrared absorption (SEIRA) and surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS), selectively probe molecular vibrations with pronounced signal enhancements, yielding improved sensitivity. In contrast to conventional noble metal enhancement, this review highlights the latest progress and applications utilizing graphene as the signal-enhancing substrate, and summarizes recent advances in graphene-based SEIRA and SERS. Following an introduction to the fundamentals of SEIRA and SERS, the different roles of graphene for infrared versus Raman spectroscopy along with the challenges in enhancing molecular vibrations are discussed. Considerations of distinct graphene structures and associated enhancement mechanisms along with selected application examples aim at determining the design of more effective SEIRA/SERS configurations utilizing graphene and its derivatives as key materials.