Determination of melamine in milk powder based on the fluorescence enhancement of Au nanoparticles

We have developed a new analytical method to detect melamine (MA) in milk powder based on the fluorescence enhancement of Au nanoparticles (AuNPs). AuNPs with the average diameter of ～16 nm can emit stable fluorescence at 370 nm when the excitation wavelength was selected at 252 nm. The AuNPs could assemble with melamine to form larger aggregates (AuNPs-MA) through electrostatic interaction and coordinating interaction in acidic conditions, which led to the significant enhancement of the fluorescence intensity. Under the optimized conditions, the enhancement of the fluorescence intensity exhibited a good linear dependence on melamine concentration in the range from 8.0 × 10(-10) to 8.0 × 10(-8) M, and the detection limit is 6.1 × 10(-10) M (3σ). This proposed method showed high precision and accuracy when applied to the real sample analyses. In conclusion, a simple, rapid, accurate and sensitive method to detect melamine has been suggested.