Affordable paper-based strips: A breakthrough in phenol detection for water samples

Area of Science:

• Environmental Science
• Analytical Chemistry
• Materials Science

Background:

• Phenolic compounds are widespread industrial pollutants, posing environmental and health risks.
• Current detection methods are often expensive and require specialized expertise.
• There is a critical need for accessible, affordable, and sustainable phenol detection techniques.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate low-cost, colorimetric paper-based sensor strips for detecting phenolic contaminants in water.
• To assess the performance of these sensors using the Folin-Ciocalteu (FC) reagent.
• To establish the limit of detection (LOD) and recovery rates for specific phenolic compounds.

Main Methods:

• Construction of paper-based sensor prototypes (WFP-1 and WFP-4) using Whatman filter papers.
• Utilizing the Folin-Ciocalteu (FC) reagent as a chromogenic probe for phenol detection.
• Quantitative analysis of color intensity using ImageJ software and recovery tests in water samples.

Main Results:

• The sensors demonstrated limits of detection (LOD) for five phenols, with values such as 6.01 mg/L for pyrogallol using WFP-1.
• A distinct order of phenol detection sensitivity was observed: pyrogallol > resorcinol > gallic acid > hydroquinone > vanillin.
• Recovery tests showed high accuracy, with WFP-1 achieving 90%-98.50% and WFP-4 achieving 97.50%-101.69% recovery for resorcinol.

Conclusions:

• The developed paper-based sensor strips are a simple, cost-effective, and efficient tool for detecting phenolic contaminants.
• These sensors offer a promising solution for widespread, on-site environmental monitoring of phenols.
• The method provides a sustainable alternative to conventional, more complex analytical techniques.