Optical Chemical Sensing Exploiting Inkjet Printing Technology and Molecularly Imprinted Polymers

We reported a low-cost optical chemical sensor for the detection of furfural (furan-2-carbaldehyde, 2-FAL) in aqueous media. This novel optical sensor platform is based on a PET (polyethylene terephthalate) substrate with a pattern of silver nanoparticles, printed on it by InkJet technology. To obtain the selective detection of the analyte, the slab waveguide has been covered by a specific molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) for 2-FAL. The sensing device has connected to a light source and a spectrometer by two plastic optical fibers (POFs), to monitor the interaction between the MIP and 2-FAL. The performances reported in this work are comparable to those of plasmonic POF sensors combined with the same MIP.