Cucurbit[n]urils as a SERS hot-spot nanocontainer through bridging gold nanoparticles

A convenient and cost-effective chemical approach was developed to fabricate Au aggregates with uniform 1 nm nanogaps through the assembly of cucurbit[n]urils with Au colloids. Cucurbit[n]urils located in the nanogap region can be used as a useful SERS hot-spot nanocontainer to realize the SERS enhancement of an inert'' molecule up to 10(9).