SERS sensors for agricultural products

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy or surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) is a scattering spectroscopy technique. It can be used as an analytical tool to detect chemical and microbial hazards in food and agricultural products. Advantages of using surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy over other analytical methods is that it is faster as it does not require sample pre-treatment and it has less interference with water. It has been used to successfully in the laboratory to identify food contaminants including farm chemicals such as pesticides, illegal food additives, veterinary drugs, toxins, and food-borne pathogenic organisms. While it has great potential to improve food safety, it has limitations that need to be overcome before it can be widely used. Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy currently has limitations that inhibit real-world application. These include susceptibility to signal interference from other components in the sample, and poor performance in terms of stability and sensitivity. Furthermore, it is also costly to develop Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy-active substrates used in the process.