Facile in Situ Synthesis of Silver Nanoparticles on the Surface of Metal–Organic Framework for Ultrasensitive Surface-Enhanced Raman Scattering Detection of Dopamine

Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) signals are intensively dominated by the Raman hot spots and distance between analyte molecules and metallic nanostructures. Herein, an efficient SERS substrate was developed by in situ synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) on the surface of MIL-101 (Fe), a typical metal–organic framework (MOF). The as-prepared SERS substrate combines the numerous Raman hot spots between the high-density Ag NPs and the excellent adsorption performance of MOFs, making it an excellent SERS substrate for highly sensitive SERS detection by effectively concentrating analytes in close proximity to the Raman hot spots domains between the adjacent AgNPs. The resulting hybrid material was used for ultrasensitive SERS detection of dopamine based on the peroxidase-like activity of MIL-101 (Fe) by utilizing the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) colorimetric substrate, 2,2′-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzthiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) diammonium salt (ABTS) as a SERS marker. This new developed method showed good linearity in the range from 1.054 pM to 210.8 nM for dopamine with the correlation coefficient of 0.992, detection limit of approximately 0.32 pM [signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) = 3], and acceptable recoveries ranging from 99.8% to 108.0% in human urine. These results predict that the proposed SERS system may open up a new opportunity for chemical and biological assay applications.