Tropane alkaloids, the secondary metabolites occurring in several plant families, including solanaceae plants, are the highly toxic chemicals to human health. The qualitative and fast determination of such chemicals deliberately dosed in drinking water and foods plays the key role towards the public security issue. Up to now, the qualitative and quantitative analysis of scopolamines in plants, drugs or drinking water, has been performed using liquid chromatography (HPLC) with the precise quantitation, however, the lab equipment and the tedious pretreatment hindered the quick response in case of emergency.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is one powerful analytical tool with low cost, high selectivity, extraordinary sensitivity and good compatibility in aqueous environments. Here, we developed SERS based protocol for the quick, qualitative and quantitative to detect several scopolamines in various drinking waters. The initial result indicated that the lowest detectable concentration was at 1 μg/L and each scopolamine can be distinguished when the mixture was at 10 μg/L.