Quantitative surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy based on the combination of magnetic nanoparticles with an advanced chemometric model

•Magnetic nanoparticles coupled with MEMSERS were applied to quantitative SERS assay.•Detrimental effects caused by the heterogeneity of nanoparticles were corrected.•R6G and thiram were determined with ARPE values of 3.2% and 7.5%,respectively.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is a leading non-destructive technique with single-molecule sensitivity and has great potential for application in various fields. However, quantitative analysis of analytes using SERS is still quite challenging, since SERS signals are significantly affected by the physical properties of SERS enhancing substrates. Here, we report the detection of rhodamine 6G (R6G) and thiram (a dithiocarbamate fungicide) by SERS technique through the combination of a recently proposed multiplicative effects model (MEM) and magnetic nanoparticles (i.e. Fe3O4@Au and Fe3O4@Ag). Experimental results showed that R6G and thiram can be accurately determined with average relative prediction error of 3.2% and 7.5%, respectively. It looks promising that SERS technique based on the combination of multiplicative effects model and magnetic nanoparticles can be applied to the quantitative assay of many other analytes.