Charge-Transfer Resonance and Electromagnetic Enhancement Synergistically Enabling MXenes with Excellent SERS Sensitivity for SARS-CoV-2 S Protein Detection

The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 has seriously threatened human health. Rapidly and sensitively detecting SARS-CoV-2 viruses can help control the spread of viruses. However, it is an arduous challenge to apply semiconductor-based substrates for virus SERS detection due to their poor sensitivity. Therefore, it is worthwhile to search novel semiconductor-based substrates with excellent SERS sensitivity. Herein we report, for the first time, Nb(2)C and Ta(2)C MXenes exhibit a remarkable SERS enhancement, which is synergistically enabled by the charge transfer resonance enhancement and electromagnetic enhancement. Their SERS sensitivity is optimized to 3.0 × 10(6) and 1.4 × 10(6) under the optimal resonance excitation wavelength of 532 nm. Additionally, remarkable SERS sensitivity endows Ta(2)C MXenes with capability to sensitively detect and accurately identify the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein. Moreover, its detection limit is as low as 5 × 10(−9) M, which is beneficial to achieve real-time monitoring and early warning of novel coronavirus. This research not only provides helpful theoretical guidance for exploring other novel SERS-active semiconductor-based materials but also provides a potential candidate for the practical applications of SERS technology. [Image: see text] ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s40820-020-00565-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.