Determination of acetylsalicylic acid in commercial tablets by SERS using silver nanoparticle-coated filter paper

•AgNPs-coated filter paper was produced to be used in SERS.•A SERS method for quantifying acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) was performed.•The calibration curve was linear and presented good precision (R2 0.933).•The method proposed was capable of quantify ASA acid at low levels.•A relative error of 2.06% compared to HPLC was obtained.

In this work, filter paper was used as a low cost substrate for silver nanoparticles in order to perform the detection and quantification of acetylsalicylic acid by SERS in a commercial tablet. The reaction conditions were 150 mM of ammonium hydroxide, 50 mM of silver nitrate, 500 mM of glucose, 12 min of the reaction time, 45 °C temperature, pretreatment with ammonium hydroxide and quantitative filter paper (1–2 μm). The average size of silver nanoparticles deposited on the paper substrate was 180 nm. Adsorption time of acetylsalicylic acid on the surface of the silver-coated filter paper was studied and an adsorption time of 80 min was used to build the analytical curve. It was possible to obtain a calibration curve with good precision with a coefficient of determination of 0.933. The method proposed in this work was capable to quantify acetylsalicylic acid in commercial tablets, at low concentration levels, with relative error of 2.06% compared to the HPLC. The preparation of filter paper coated with silver nanoparticles using Tollen’s reagent presents several advantages such as low cost of synthesis, support and reagents; minimum amount of residuals, which are easily treated, despite the SERS spectroscopy presenting fast analysis, with low sample preparation and low amount of reactants as in HPLC analysis.

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