On monolithic nanoporous silver (NPS), via DNA hybridization, we constructed an NPS/DNA-Cy5/silver nanoparticle (Ag NP) sandwich to investigate its SERS effect. In this sandwich, no chemical enhancement contributes to the SERS signal of Cy5. As compared with NPS, the present substrate exhibits particularly strong electromagnetic (EM) field enhancement. At the same Ag NPs surface loading, the SERS intensity decreases exponentially with increasing the length of double-stranded DNA (dsDNA). A larger pore size of NPS leads to weaker EM enhancement within the sandwich, but the relative intensity is not sensitive to the sizes and it is determined by the length of dsDNA. (C) 2012 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.