Quick detection of contaminants leaching from polypropylene centrifuge tubes with surface‐enhanced Raman spectroscopy and ultraviolet absorption spectroscopy

Abstract

Anomalous surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) peaks were identified for liquid sample stored in polypropylene (PP) centrifuge tubes for months. We observed unexpected Raman peaks during experiments with thiamine hydrochloride aqueous solutions stored in PP tubes for 2 months. In order to identify the contaminants, we have performed SERS experiments on deionized (DI) water stored in PP centrifuge tubes for 2 months and compared them with those from fresh DI water sample. We have also carried out ultraviolet (UV) absorption spectra for both fresh and contaminated water. We believe that the water is contaminated because of chemicals leaching from the PP tube. From the gas chromatography-mass spectrometry data, the main contaminants were found to be phthalic acid (PA) and its derivatives. Further SERS and UV absorption experiment for PA correlated well with the anomalous peaks identified earlier. We qualitatively confirmed the identification and quantitatively estimated the concentration of the suspect contaminants as between 1 and 10 µM with both SERS and UV absorption spectroscopy. With UV absorption spectroscopy, we precisely estimated the concentration as 2.1 µM. We have shown that the sample in PP tube can be contaminated by the leaching chemicals upon long-term storage, and suggest SERS and UV absorption spectroscopy as two quick and simple techniques to detect the contamination.

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“…did not provide brand-names nor other details on the type of polypropylene centrifuge tube tested. Also, the authors assume that in most cases, leaching of compounds from such plastics represents negligible amounts, which are unlikely to be toxic to humans but still may hamper experimental results14. Our results support the second part of that assumption.…”

Nanoreplicated positive and inverted submicrometer polymer pyramid array for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy

“…Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a highly sensitive and versatile technique in analytical chemistry. The applications of SERS span a range of fields including bacteria detection, water contamination detection, protein-DNA interaction analysis, forensic investigation and archeological identification [1][2][3][4]. The most important role in SERS is played by the roughed metal surface, which can enhance the Raman scattering of molecules adsorbed or in proximity to the surface.…”

Recent advances in linear and nonlinear Raman spectroscopy. Part VI

“…Compared with that in other approaches, the reported limit of detection can be significantly improved to the sub‐ppb (sub‐parts‐per‐billion) level, which indicates that decorated triangular gold nanoprisms can be widely applied to trace analysis of explosive or warfare agents. Xu and co‐workers described the rapid detection of contaminants leaching from polypropylene centrifuge tubes with SERS and UV absorption spectroscopy . It is concluded that the leaching chemicals during long‐term storage can be detected easily by SERS and UV absorption spectroscopy.…”