Advances in Biomimetic Systems for Molecular Recognition and Biosensing

Abstract

Understanding the fundamentals of natural design, structure, and function has pushed the limits of current knowledge and has enabled us to transfer knowledge from the bench to the market as a product. In particular, biomimicry-one of the crucial strategies in this respect-has allowed researchers to tackle major challenges in the disciplines of engineering, biology, physics, materials science, and medicine. It has an enormous impact on these fields with pivotal applications, which are not limited to the applications of biocompatible tooth implants, programmable drug delivery systems, biocompatible tissue scaffolds, organ-on-a-chip systems, wearable platforms, molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs), and smart biosensors. Among them, MIPs provide a versatile strategy to imitate the procedure of molecular recognition precisely, creating structural fingerprint replicas of molecules for biorecognition studies. Owing to their affordability, easy-to-fabricate/use features, stability, specificity, and multiplexing capabilities, host-guest recognition systems have largely benefitted from the MIP strategy. This review article is structured with four major points: (i) determining the requirement of biomimetic systems and denoting multiple examples in this manner; (ii) introducing the molecular imprinting method and reviewing recent literature to elaborate the power and impact of MIPs on a variety of scientific and industrial fields; (iii) exemplifying the MIP-integrated systems, i.e., chromatographic systems, lab-on-a-chip systems, and sensor systems; and (iv) closing remarks.

Keywords: biomimetic; biorecognition; biosensing; molecularly imprinted systems.

Figure 1

Scheme of the synthesis, and recognition of the molecularly imprinted polymer. Republished with permission from Ansari et al. [61].

Figure 2

Chromatograms after the extraction of cocaine on plasma and saliva samples (a). The indicators in the plot: imprinted (A) and non-imprinted (B) of plasma spiked with cocaine compared to the blank plasma (C); imprinted (D) and non-imprinted (E) of saliva spiked with cocaine compared to the blank saliva (F). Chromatograms before and after extraction of real black tea samples (b). The indicators in the plot: unspiked black tea sample before (I) and after (II) extraction. Republished with permission from Bouvarel et al. and Rahimi et al. [71,72].

Figure 3

Preparation of the erythromycin-imprinted electrochemical sensor (a) and cerebral dopamine neurotrophic factor protein-imprinted surface acoustic wave sensor (b). Republished with permission from Ayankojo et al. and Kidakova et al. [87,88].

Figure 4

The preparation process of the paper-based microfluidic systems for the determination of phenolic contaminants (a). The indicators in the plot: a complete chip under daylight (I), image of the six test sites on the chip under UV light (II), image of the test site through the hole of the top sampling layer under UV light (III), and schematic of the entire working process of the rotational chip and an image of rotational paper-based microfluidic chips placed and the detection process in the fluorescence spectrometer (IV). The preparation steps of the system to determine glycoprotein ovalbumin (b). Republished with permission from Qi et al. and Sun et al. [99,100].