SERS from pyridine adsorbed on electrochemically roughened silver was first observed by Martin Fleischmann, Patrick J. Hendra and A. James McQuillan at the Department of Chemistry at the University of Southampton, UK in 1973. This initial publication has been cited over 6000 times. The 40th Anniversary of the first observation of the SERS effect has been marked by the Royal Society of Chemistry by the award of a National Chemical Landmark plaque to the University of Southampton. In 1977, two groups independently noted that the concentration of scattering species could not account for the enhanced signal and each proposed a mechanism for the observed enhancement. Their theories are still accepted as explaining the SERS effect. Jeanmaire and Richard Van Duyne
proposed an electromagnetic effect, while Albrecht and Creighton
proposed a charge-transfer effect. Rufus Ritchie, of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Health Sciences Research Division, predicted the existence of the surface plasmon.