Ultrasensitive and fast detection of pathogens using Europium-containing polystyrene nanospheres in a homemade portable NMR diagnostic system

•Europium-containing polystyrene nanosphere is used in NMR diagnostics system for multiplexed, quantitative and rapid analysis of pathogens.•A low-cost homemade NMR portable platform is developed using field programmable gate array.•The Europium-containing polystyrene nanosphere-based NMR platform can rapidly detect pathogens in native biological samples, with higher detection sensitivity, broader detection range, and better stability than the conventional iron oxide nanoparticle-based NMR platforms.•A microcontact printing method is demonstrated for low-cost Ag microcoils based NMR probe fabrication.