A Nanocomposite of Silver Nanoparticles and Porous g-C3N4 for Recyclable SERS Detection of Trace Fluorene

Fluorene, as one of the important organic compounds widely used in the field of medicine and photoelectric materials, could damage human health even if it is extremely low in the environment. The development of ultrasensitive and easy-recyclable surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) detection of trace fluorene is highly desired. In this work, a nanocomposite of Ag nanoparticles (Ag NPs) and porous g-C3N4 is synthesized by a facile method. The advantageous features of the as-prepared nanocomposite include a high SERS sensitivity due to the plasmonic effect of the Ag NPs, excellent recyclability due to the self-cleaning ability originating from the photocatalytic degradation of porous g-C3N4 under visible light irradiation, and good adsorption due to the large specific surface area of porous g-C3N4. The experimental results show that an ultralow detection limit of 1.35 × 10–13 M for R6G can be achieved. Especially, the nanocomposite exhibits excellent performance for the detection of fluorene with the detection limit of 3.11 × 10–11 M and multidetection of at least 13 cycles. The present research provides a nanocomposite with excellent synergistic activity of plasmonic enhancement and photocatalytic degradation for the recyclable SERS detection of trace fluorene.