Abstract
The study was aimed to validate paper strip sensors for the detection of pesticide residues in milk, cereal-based food, and fruit juices in comparison with GC-MS/MS under field conditions. The detection limit of pesticide using rapid paper strip sensor for organophosphate, carbamate, organochlorine, fungicide, and herbicide group ranges from 1 to 10, 1-50, 250-500, 1-50, and 1 ppb, respectively in milk and milk product, cereal-based food and fruit juices. Among 125 samples of milk samples collected from the market 33 milk samples comprising 31 raw milk and 2 pasteurized milk found positive for pesticide using the strip-based sensor. In cereal based food and fruit juice samples, 6 cereal flours and 4 fruit juices were found positive for pesticide residues. The pesticide positive samples were further evaluated quantitatively using GC-MS/MS wherein 7 samples comprised of raw milk, pasteurized milk, rice flour, wheat flour, maize flour, apple juice, and pomegranate juice have shown the presence of chlorpyrifos, chlorpyrifos-methyl, α-endosulfan, β-endosulfan DDD and DDT at trace level as well as at above MRL level. It is envisaged that the developed paper strip sensor can be a potential tool in the rapid and cost-effective screening of a large number of food samples for pesticide residues.