Simultaneous determination of benzimidazole fungicides in food using signal optimized label-free HAu/Ag NS-SERS sensor.

Extensively employed pesticide in agriculture causes residue in food products that would threaten public health safety. The surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) signal reliant on double sensing of carbendazim and thiabendazole in a single step is achieved without the aid of any bio-recognition element. A label-free anisotropic bimetallic hollow Au/Ag nanostars (HAu/Ag NS) SERS substrate was synthesized with numerous hot spots for Raman molecule through a galvanic displacement-free deposition. The individual and mixed analyte calibration results were compared based on the identified peak at 1224 (carbendazim) and 778 (thiabendazole) cm ^-1 and exhibited insignificant differences. The sensor could detect carbendazim and thiabendazole up to 4.28 × 10 ^-4 and 6.04 × 10 ^-4 µg·g ^-1 or µg·mL ^-1 in both individual and mixture of their extract. The recovery for accuracy and precision analysis was 91.54-98.26 % in rice and water. Finally, validation results were achieved satisfactorily (p > 0.05) with HPLC.
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