A Novel Polyaniline Nanofiber Combined with Toluidine Blue as a Sensitive Detection Platform for Lignin by Raman Spectroscopy

Abstract

Raman spectroscopy is widely applied in wood science because of its features of being nondestructive, rapidity, and high resolution. However, Raman scattering is weak, and the Raman signal is easily disturbed by autofluorescence arising from endogenous fluorescent molecules in biological tissue. In this work, a sensitive lignin detection platform was fabricated by a composite with a polyaniline (PANI) nanofiber and toluidine blue (TB) under the excitation of visible light. In this platform, TB acts as a specific marker for lignin, and a PANI nanofiber was used as a reinforcing reagent to improve the Raman intensity of TB. When wood slice is impregnated with TB/PANI, the lignin in wood can be precisely labeled with the TB, and the Raman intensity of TB had a threefold increase at 532 nm excitation. This TB/PANI detection platform is expected to make a significant contribution in qualitative and quantitative analysis of lignin to avoid autofluorescence in various lignin-based biosciences.