Silica Nanoparticles Coated with Smaller Au Nanoparticles for the Enhancement of Optical Oxygen Sensing

In the vicinity of metal nanostructures, phosphorescent intensity can be greatly enhanced through the localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR). The enhancement of phosphorescence intensity in noble-metal nanoparticle (NP) systems is highly dependent on the overlap of the absorbance peak of a noble metal with that of phosphorescent dyes. When the peak of the NPs’ absorption spectra has a maximum overlap with that of these dyes, the phosphorescence enhancement is the largest. Here, we use a seeded growth method to synthesize SiO2/Au NPs with tunable plasmonic resonance and compare their phosphorescence enhancement for an oxygen range of 0–21%. The measurement sensitivity of oxygen is strongly dependent on the enhancement of phosphorescence. When used with PtTFPP, when the absorbance peak of the SiO2/Au NPs has a maximum overlap with that of PtTFPP, the phosphorescence enhancement factor is as high as 7; the sensitivity of oxygen concentration is as high as 75. Moreover, we also optimize the performance by varying the number of NPs to eliminate the nonradiative energy-transfer (NRET) process and self-quenching.