Detection of Whey Protein in a Hot Dog Using Immunomagnetic Separation Coupled with Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy

Abstract

With the passing of recent legislation, most notably the Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act in 2006 and the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2011, the focus on allergens in the food supply is a top priority for the food industry. With the consideration of unintentional allergens now being considered an adulteration, companies are trying to find detection methods that can accurately identify an unintentional allergen, but that are also rapid enough to use so as not to interrupt the production line. Immunomagnetic Separation (IMS) coupled with Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS) was investigated in this research as one possible detection method. We decided to test and compare two types of IMS methods, antibody and aptamer, to see if one or the other would produce better results. The methods were based off of previous work by Dr. Lili He and were adapted to detect whey in a hot dog. During initial testing in a pure solution, both of the IMS methods appeared to show similar results, both being able to detect whey at levels of at least 125μg/mL of solution. But once we switched over testing whey in a hot dog, the antibody based IMS method proved to be the better IMS method. With a detection limit of 600μg of whey protein isolate/g of hot dog, the antibody based IMS method proved to be the more effective method. The aptamer IMS method ran into trouble with non-specific binding to the magnetic beads and was unable to detect any whey protein isolate in the hot dogs during the experiment. It is therefore concluded by the results of this experiment that the antibody based 6 IMS-SERS method is a better method to detect whey protein in a hot dog versus the aptamer method.