In this work, we report the enhanced catalytic reduction of 4-nitrophenol driven by Fe₃O₄-Au magnetic nanocomposite interface engineering. A facile solvothermal method is employed for Fe₃O₄ hollow microspheres and Fe₃O₄-Au magnetic nanocomposite synthesis via a seed deposition process. Complementary structural, chemical composition and valence state studies validate that the as-obtained samples are formed in a pure magnetite phase. A series of characterizations including conventional scanning/transmission electron microscopy (SEM/TEM), Mössbauer spectroscopy, magnetic testing and elemental mapping is conducted to unveil the structural and physical characteristics of the developed Fe₃O₄-Au magnetic nanocomposites. By adjusting the quantity of Au seeds coating on the polyethyleneimine-dithiocarbamates (PEI-DTC)-modified surfaces of Fe₃O₄ hollow microspheres, the correlation between the amount of Au seeds and the catalytic ability of Fe₃O₄-Au magnetic nanocomposites for 4-nitrophenol (4-NP) is investigated systematically. Importantly, bearing remarkable recyclable features, our developed Fe₃O₄-Au magnetic nanocomposites can be readily separated with a magnet. Such Fe₃O₄-Au magnetic nanocomposites shine the light on highly efficient catalysts for 4-NP reduction at the mass production level.

In this study, we designed shell-dependent Ag@Cu ₂ O core–shell nanoparticles (NPs) for SERS study. Compared to Cu ₂ O NPs, Ag@Cu ₂ O core–shell NPs exhibited high SERS activity because of the localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) from Ag core.

Hexagonal close-packed tilted Ag nanorod arrays that exhibit excellent uniformity and reproducibility were prepared. The polarization dependence of SERS of nanorod array is fundamentally explained by integrating the experimental and theoretical numerical simulation data.

The nanocaps array of TiO₂/Ag bilayer with different Ag thicknesses and co-sputtering TiO₂-Ag monolayer with different TiO₂ contents were fabricated on a two-dimensional colloidal array substrate for the investigation of Surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) properties. For the TiO₂/Ag bilayer, when the Ag thickness increased, SERS intensity decreased. Meanwhile, a significant enhancement was observed when the sublayer Ag was 10 nm compared to the pure Ag monolayer, which was ascribed to the metal-semiconductor synergistic effect that electromagnetic mechanism (EM) provided by roughness surface and charge-transfer (CT) enhancement mechanism from TiO₂-Ag composite components. In comparison to the TiO₂/Ag bilayer, the co-sputtered TiO₂-Ag monolayer decreased the aggregation of Ag particles and led to the formation of small Ag particles, which showed that TiO₂ could effectively inhibit the aggregation and growth of Ag nanoparticles.