SERS sensing of perampanel with nanostructured arrays of gold particles produced by pulsed laser ablation in water

Noble metal nanoparticles (NPs) are among the most extensively studied colloidal systems, due to their surface plasmon resonances (SPR) of interest for biological sensing. We report here the synthesis of Au nanoparticles as water‐based colloids by nanosecond (τ = 5 ns) and picosecond (τ = 6 ps) pulsed laser ablation at the fixed fluence of 1.5 J/cm2 (λ = 532 nm) and different irradiation times (20 minutes, ns irradiations; 5 minutes, ps irradiations). Both ns and ps ablation lead to the synthesis of highly stable and chemically pure NPs. ps pulses allow synthesizing in remarkably short times (few minutes) smaller NPs with a narrower size distribution than using ns pulses. The surface‐enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) activity of Au NPs produced by ps ablation was tested, obtaining the first SERS spectrum of the new generation antiepileptic drug perampanel, whose clinical interest is relevant.