Nanosensors and biochips: frontiers in biomolecular diagnostics

In the past two decades, the biotechnology and medical fields have seen gre at advances in the development of novel technologies that open new horizons for identifying and quantifying biomolecules, and diagnosing diseases. Thi s manuscript provides an overview of two of those important technologies, n anosensors and biochips. We describe various types of nanosensors and bioch ips that have been developed for biological and medical applications, along with significant advances achieved over the last several years in these te chnologies. Some applications of nanosensors, developed in our laboratory f or single-cell analysis, and applications of biochips for biological sensin g of pathogenic agents and medical diagnostics are described to illustrate the usefulness and potential of these technologies. (C) 2001 Elsevier Scien ce B.V. Ah rights reserved.