Fast Detection of Trace Enrofloxacin and Ciprofloxacin in Chicken Meat by Surface-enhanced Raman Spectroscopy

With the increasing public concern on food quality, especially the zero-tolerance of illegal additives, the rapid qualitative and quantitative analysis of trace banned substances in food is in a prosperity stage in the field of food safety. Here, by combining with a self-developed rapid pretreatment kit, an on-site, rapid and sensitive detection strategy for trace antibiotics such as enrofloxacin and ciprofloxacin, two typical abused antibiotics in livestock and other industries, by surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) technique was developed. The abused quinolones residues in chicken meat (3 kinds of silky chicken meat and 2 kinds of plain chicken meat) were successfully screened by the developed SERS method, which showed an accurate qualification and a reliable quantitation in comparison with that by standard high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS) technique. The proposed SERS-based strategy may provide a practical and simple method for rapid detection of other quinolones in real samples.

Automated summary

With the increasing public concern on food quality, the qualitative and quantitative analysis of trace banned substances in food is prospering in the field of food safety. A rapid and sensitive detection strategy for trace antibiotics in livestock was developed using surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy. The proposed SERS-based strategy showed accurate qualification and reliable quantitation compared to standard HPLC-MS/MS technique, providing a practical method for rapid detection of other similar substances in real samples.