Flower-like silver nanostructures have been successfully synthesized via liquid phase reduction method, which has tremendous “hot spots” than regular structure.

It is found that the proper coating degree of surfactant on silver nuclei leads to anisotropic growth of the silver nuclei resulting in the formation of flower-like structure with more protrusions.

Flower-like silver nanostructures described in this work exhibit high SERS activity and excellent stability, which can serve as an effective SERS substrate for caffeine.

The average intensity of caffeine SERS signals at 807 cm⁻¹(NCH), 958 cm⁻¹(Pyrimidine ring) and 1327 cm⁻¹ (Imidazole trigonal ring) linear decreased with the −log₁₀ C (C is the concentration of caffeine), and the coefficient of determination (R²) is as high as 0.975.