Simple cleaning and regeneration of tip‐enhanced Raman spectroscopy probe with UV sources

Tip-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (TERS) is a powerful nano-optical approach that allows the extraction of nanometer resolved chemical information. The key to a successful TERS measurement is the quality of the TERS tip. However, tip contamination, which usually occurs during measurements on samples that include organic molecules or after long-term storage, remains a critical problem for TERS experiments. It not only affects the reliability of TERS results but also hinders the long-term development of the TERS technique. Herein, we propose a method that enables the regeneration of contaminated TERS tips. For this purpose, we prepared a TERS tip contaminated by stable organic molecules, which was subjected to a simple and rapid ultraviolet (UV) cleaning procedure to remove the contaminants and to regenerate the tip. This method is demonstrated to be effective in removing the contaminants from the TERS tip by directly breaking the bonds in the contaminated molecules and oxidizing organic compounds with the generated reactive oxygen atom. This simple method could propel the development of the TERS technique.