One key contribution from Alan Stone's research group has been the clear elucidation of the role that chemical structure plays in the fate and reactivity of environmental contaminants. In this effort we extend this approach to the examination of how chemical structure affects analyte detection by surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS). Using both a suite of differentially functionalized anilines as well as environmentally relevant compounds such as atrazine, carbamezepine, and melamine we show that analyte pKa systematically dictates the intensity of the SERS signal and in turn the detection limit. This study was enabled by our recent development of a nanocellulose-gold nanoparticle nanocomposite with high SERS enhancement. By using the approach developed by Alan and his collleagues, we are able to move SERS based contaminant collection one step closer towards widespread application.

Chemical structure impacts on surface enhanced Raman spectroscopic detection of environmental pollutants

252nd National Meeting (2016)

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