Microfluidic paper-based chip platform for formaldehyde concentration detection

•A microfluidic paper-based chip platform is proposed for CH2O detection.•This study is based on the Hantzsch reaction and combined with microfluidics technology.•CH2O concentrations of 11 commercial food samples are measured.•The measurement results deviate by no more than 4.7% versus official method.

An integrated platform consisting of a microfluidic paper-based chip and a mini-box detection system is proposed for the concentration detection of formaldehyde. In the proposed approach, the reaction region of the paper-based chip is implanted with Acetoacetanilide reagent, and the formaldehyde concentration is deduced from the UV light-induced fluorescence intensity of the formaldehyde-Acetoacetanilide complex (dihydropyridine) produced in a Hantzsch reaction process at room temperature for 2 min. The experimental results obtained using control samples with formaldehyde concentrations ranging from 0 to 8 ppm show that the formaldehyde concentration (Y) and fluorescence intensity (X) are related as Y = 0.0039 e0.058X. Moreover, the correlation coefficient (R2) is equal to 0.9987. The real-world applicability of the proposed paper-based platform is demonstrated by measuring the formaldehyde concentration in eleven commercial food samples. It is found that the measurement results deviate from those obtained using a standard bench top method by no more than 4.7%. Overall, the results presented in this study show that the proposed system provides a rapid and reliable technique for formaldehyde concentration detection.

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