Smart optical sensing of multiple antibiotic residues from wastewater effluents with ensured specificity using SERS assisted with multivariate analysis

Sefeera Sadik; Soumya Columbus; Sourjya Bhattacharjee; Shaiju S Nazeer; Krithikadevi Ramachandran; Kais Daoudi; Hussain Alawadhi; Mounir Gaidi; Abdallah Shanableh

doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2023.123229

Smart optical sensing of multiple antibiotic residues from wastewater effluents with ensured specificity using SERS assisted with multivariate analysis

Environ Pollut. 2024 Feb 15:343:123229. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2023.123229. Epub 2023 Dec 28.

Authors

Sefeera Sadik¹, Soumya Columbus², Sourjya Bhattacharjee³, Shaiju S Nazeer⁴, Krithikadevi Ramachandran⁵, Kais Daoudi⁶, Hussain Alawadhi⁶, Mounir Gaidi⁶, Abdallah Shanableh³

Affiliations

¹ Research Institute of Sciences and Engineering, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, PO Box 27272, United Arab Emirates.
² Centre for Advanced Materials Research, Research Institute of Sciences and Engineering, University of Sharjah, PO Box 27272, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. Electronic address: spal@sharjah.ac.ae.
³ Research Institute of Sciences and Engineering, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, PO Box 27272, United Arab Emirates; Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, P.O. Box 27272, United Arab Emirates.
⁴ Department of Chemistry, Indian Institute of Space Sciences and Technology, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, 695 547, India.
⁵ Centre for Advanced Materials Research, Research Institute of Sciences and Engineering, University of Sharjah, PO Box 27272, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.
⁶ Centre for Advanced Materials Research, Research Institute of Sciences and Engineering, University of Sharjah, PO Box 27272, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates; Department of Applied Physics and Astronomy, University of Sharjah, PO Box 27272, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.

PMID: 38159632
DOI: 10.1016/j.envpol.2023.123229

Abstract

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy offers great potential for rapid and highly sensitive detection of pharmaceuticals from environmental sources. Herein, we investigated the feasibility of label-free sensing of antibiotic residues from wastewater effluents with high specificity by combining with multivariate analysis. Highly ordered silver nanoarrays with ∼34 nm roughness have been fabricated using a cost-effective electroless deposition technique. As-fabricated Ag arrays showed superior LSPR effects with an enhancement factor of 8 × 10⁷. Excellent reproducibility has also been noticed with RSD values within 11%, whilst the sensor showed good stability and reusability characteristics for being used as a low-cost and reusable sensor. SERS studies demonstrated that antibiotics-spiked wastewater effluents can be detected with high efficiency in a label-free method. The molecular fingerprint bands of antibiotics such as sulfamethoxazole, sulfadiazine, and ciprofloxacin were well analyzed in effluent, tap, and deionized water. It has been found that antibiotics can be detected near picomolar levels; meanwhile, liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) exhibited a detection limit within nanomolar concentrations only. Furthermore, the specificity of SERS sensing has been further analyzed using a multivariate analysis method, principal component analysis followed by linear discriminant analysis (PCA-LDA); which showed prominent discrimination to distinguish each antibiotic residue from wastewater effluents. The current study presented the potential of Ag nanoarray sensors for rapid, highly specific, and cost-effective analysis of pharmaceutical products for environmental remediation applications.

Keywords: Ciprofloxacin; Principal component analysis; Silver nanoparticles; Sulfadiazine; Sulfamethoxazole; Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy.

MeSH terms

Anti-Bacterial Agents* / analysis
Metal Nanoparticles* / chemistry
Multivariate Analysis
Reproducibility of Results
Silver / chemistry
Spectrum Analysis, Raman / methods
Wastewater

Substances

Anti-Bacterial Agents
Wastewater
Silver