Facile and sensitive detection of clenbuterol in pork using a personal glucose meter

Clenbuterol (CLB) is a β-agonist drug that is illegally added as a growth-promoting agent in livestock. In this study, a facile and sensitive method for the detection of CLB using a personal glucose meter (PGM) was reported. Clenbuterol–bovine serum albumin functionalized magnetic beads were used to compete with CLB for binding to its corresponding antibody and gold nanoparticle–invertase–secondary antibody conjugates. In the sucrose solution, the invertase catalyzes the hydrolysis of sucrose to produce a large amount of glucose and quantitative readout using the PGM. The ratio of signals from the PGM before and after addition of CLB exhibits a good linear correlation with the logarithm of the CLB concentrations in the range of 0.1–100 ng mL−1 with a detection limit of 0.1 ng mL−1 (S/N = 3). Finally, the proposed method was successfully applied for the detection of CLB residues in pork and liver samples.