Food safety is a topic of great importance for our society which places high demands on analytical methods. Surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) meets the requirements for a rapid, sensitive and specific detection technique. The fact that metallic colloids, one of the most often used SERS substrates, are usually prepared in aqueous solution makes the detection of water-insoluble substances challenging. In this paper we present a SERS based approach for the detection of water-insoluble molecules by applying a hydrophobic surface modification onto the surface of enzymatic generated silver nanoparticles. By this approach the detection of the illegal water-insoluble food dyes, such as Sudan III in presence of riboflavin, as water-soluble competitor, is possible. Moreover, we demonstrate the usability of this kind of SERS substrates for determination of Sudan III out of spiked paprika extracts.
Keywords: Food safety; Sensor layers; Sudan dye detection; Surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy.
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