Farmers use numerous pesticides to protect seeds and crops before, during & after harvesting. The pesticide residues may enter the food chain through air, water and soil. They affect the ecosystem and cause several health problems to animals and humans. Chromatographic methods, used for pesticide analysis are time-consuming, laborious, requires expensive equipment and/or highly-trained technicians.
To overcome these drawbacks, a simple paper-based biosensor is being developed for rapid screening of organophosphate (OP) and carbamate (CM) pyrethroid pesticides on the fruit and vegetables. This technique is based on the competitive inhibition of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) enzyme by the pesticides present on the samples. This sensor can be used to detect the pesticide in food, beverage, soil and water samples.
