Here, we present a surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) nanosensor for environmental pollutants detection. This study was conducted on three polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs): benzo[a]pyrene (BaP), fluoranthene (FL), and naphthalene (NAP). SERS substrates were chemically functionalized using 4-dodecyl benzenediazonium-tetrafluoroborate and SERS analyses were conducted to detect the pollutants alone and in mixtures. Compounds were first measured in water-methanol (9:1 volume ratio) samples. Investigation on solutions containing concentrations ranging from 10-6 g L-1 to 10-3 g L-1 provided data to plot calibration curves and to determine the performance of the sensor. The calculated limit of detection (LOD) was 0.026 mg L-1 (10-7 mol L-1) for BaP, 0.064 mg L-1 (3.2 × 10-7 mol L-1) for FL, and 3.94 mg L-1 (3.1 × 10-5 mol L-1) for NAP, respectively. The correlation between the calculated LOD values and the octanol-water partition coefficient (Kow) of the investigated PAHs suggests that the developed nanosensor is particularly suitable for detecting highly non-polar PAH compounds. Measurements conducted on a mixture of the three analytes (i) demonstrated the ability of the developed technology to detect and identify the three analytes in the mixture; (ii) provided the exact quantitation of pollutants in a mixture. Moreover, we optimized the surface regeneration step for the nanosensor.
Keywords: detection; diazonium salt; nanosensor; polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH); surface functionalization; surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS).