Chemical aspects of immobilized systems in biotechnologies

Biotechnological applications using immobilized systems have recorded fast development in last years. The paper tries to deal with chemical aspects of immobilized biotechnologies. It is aimed primarily at definition of immobi lization techniques and their modifications. For every method, the principl e of immobilization and the most frequently used carriers are described. Th e appropriate matrix materials such as agar, agarose, kappa-carrageenan, al ginate, pectates, protein carriers, chitosan, polyacrylamide and other synt hetic carriers are characterized more in detail. Basic principles of covale nt coupling are presented as chemical equations. Several examples of applic ations of immobilized systems in both food and nonfood biotechnological pro cesses are mentioned.