Flexible silver ring SERS substrate array fabrication by vortex evaporation method and its application for high sensitive detection of sulfonamides residues in water

Flexible surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates have driven much attention in Raman detection of environmental pollutants due to their unique advantage of sensitivity, low-cost and fast sampling. However, it is still a high challenge for fabricating flexible SERS substrate with high reproducibility and sensitivity. In this study, we developed a novel silver nanoparticle assembly method based on vortex evaporation method to batch assemble multiple silver ring (SR) SERS substrate array on a parafilm. The flexible SR SERS substrates were uniformly covered with active silver nano-islands, which significantly improved the Raman signal intensity of the targets by 126 folds and showed 5 times Raman enhancement compared with the common SERS substrate by direct evaporation method, and also represented the unique bending response properties of flexible substrate. The Raman detection for sulfonamide residues in water with SR SERS substrate represented high sensitivity, which limits of detection for Sulfapyridine and Sulfacloropyridazine were 9.46 and 9.3 × 10 −8 mol/L, respectively. The quantitative relationships were obtained in wide linear range of 4 orders with good accuracy and stability. The flexible SR SERS substrate array can be large-scale prepared with good repeatability, stability, and low-cost, which has promising applications for trace contaminants detection in water environment.