Significance Surface features of a virus are very important in determining its virility. For example, the spike protein of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) binds to the ACE2 receptor site of the host cell with a much stronger affinity than did the original SARS virus. Thus, it is clearly important to understand the virion surface structure. To that end, the present paper combines the spatial resolution of atomic force microscopy and the spectral resolution of coherent Raman spectroscopy. This combination of tip-enhanced microscopy using femtosecond adaptive spectroscopic techniques for coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (FAST CARS) with enhanced resolution (FASTER CARS) allows us to map a single virus particle with nanometer resolution and chemical specificity. From the famous 1918 H1N1 influenza to the present COVID-19 pandemic, the need for improved viral detection techniques is all too apparent. The aim of the present paper is to show that identification of individual virus particles in clinical sample materials quickly and reliably is near at hand. First of all, our team has developed techniques for identification of virions based on a modular atomic force microscopy (AFM). Furthermore, femtosecond adaptive spectroscopic techniques with enhanced resolution via coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (FASTER CARS) using tip-enhanced techniques markedly improves the sensitivity [M. O. Scully, et al ., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 99, 10994–11001 (2002)].
【저자키워드】 virus detection, coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS), tip-enhanced Raman scattering (TERS),