ARMADILLO at the 12th International Conference on Micro-Nanoelectronics, Nanotechnology and MEMS

The ARMADILLO project presented new results at the Micro&Nano 2025 Conference, 6-9 November 2025 at Chania Greece, highlighting a promising class of silver-coated boehmite nanostructured surfaces designed for high-performance Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS).

The work, developed by teams from the Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology and the Immunoassays/Immunosensors Lab at NCSR Demokritos, together with ThetaMetrisis S.A., focuses on low-cost, reproducible SERS substrates with strong signal enhancement and large-area uniformity. The method relies on forming boehmite nanostructures through controlled oxidation of thin aluminum films, followed by precise silver sputtering.

During the conference, the group demonstrated that these engineered surfaces deliver enhancement factors above 10⁷ for Rhodamine 6G when using an 80 nm silver coating, and similarly strong performance for uric acid with a 40 nm coating. The results outperform several commercial SERS substrates, confirming the technology’s potential for sensitive biomolecular detection.

This contribution reflects ARMADILLO’s objective to advance next-generation detection platforms using scalable nanofabrication strategies. Our recent nanostructured silver-coated boehmite substrates demonstrate the high enhancement, uniformity, and reproducibility required for real-world SERS applications. This result directly supports ARMADILLO’s mission to deliver portable, rapid, and reliable GHB detection tools.

Zenodo Link to the publication : Silver-coated nanostructured boehmite surfaces as substrates for Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy