Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy Applications in Drug Monitoring
Summary
Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS) has emerged as a highly sensitive analytical technique for monitoring therapeutic and investigational drugs in biological fluids. By exploiting the intense electromagnetic fields generated at metallic nanostructure surfaces, SERS enables molecular fingerprinting at trace concentrations, often down to single-molecule levels. Advances in substrate design, surface chemistry and sample pretreatment have addressed longstanding challenges posed by complex matrices such as blood or urine. Contemporary efforts focus on antifouling coatings, tailored recognition layers and integration with portable Raman instruments to facilitate rapid, label-free, point-of-care testing. Applications span real-time pharmacokinetic profiling, therapeutic drug monitoring and in vivo sensing, reflecting SERS’s growing role in precision medicine.
Research from Nature Portfolio
Recent studies have demonstrated a hierarchical surface-chemistry strategy that combines a self-assembled monolayer with a grafted zwitterionic polymer brush on gold substrates. This dual-layer approach repels protein fouling while attracting small-molecule drugs, enabling quantitative, dynamic measurement of anticancer agents, antidepressants and anti-seizure medications in undiluted plasma. The platform achieves rapid read-out of drug concentrations at clinically relevant levels, offering a generalised tool for SERS-based therapeutic drug monitoring in complex real-world media.
Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy Applications in Drug Monitoring publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in surface-enhanced raman spectroscopy applications in drug monitoring across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Surface plasmon: collective oscillation of conduction electrons at a metal–dielectric interface that amplifies local electromagnetic fields.
Hot spot: nanoscale region of greatly enhanced electromagnetic intensity on or between metallic nanostructures, crucial for SERS signal amplification.
Self-assembled monolayer (SAM): organised molecular film spontaneously formed on a surface to impart selective binding or chemical functionality.
Zwitterionic polymer brush: densely grafted polymer layer bearing both positive and negative charges, providing non-fouling properties in biological fluids.
Pharmacokinetics: study of drug absorption, distribution, metabolism and excretion over time, informing dosage and therapeutic monitoring.
References
- Biomedical SERS – the current state and future trends. Chemical Society Reviews (2024).
- Hierarchical zwitterionic modification of a SERS substrate enables real-time drug monitoring in blood plasma. Nature Communications (2016).
- Digital colloid-enhanced Raman spectroscopy for the pharmacokinetic detection of bioorthogonal drugs. Chemical Science (2024).
- The Role of Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering for Therapeutic Drug Monitoring of Antimicrobial Agents. Chemosensors (2022).
- Application of Aluminum Hydroxide for Improvement of Label-Free SERS Detection of Some Cephalosporin Antibiotics in Urine. Biosensors (2019).
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