Adhesion Molecules-28

Advances and Experimental-1

Aging-9

Agricultural Biotechnology-37

Angiogenesis-29

Antisense-4

Apoptosis-49

Atherosclerosis-12

Autoimmunity-69

Bacterial Virulence-18

Bioinformatics-13

BioMaterials-18

Biosurfactants-1

Biotechnology-99

Cancer Genetics-25

Cancer Metastasis-19

Cell Biology-16

Cell Cycle-34

Cell Metabolism-327

Channels and Transporters-79

Chaperones-11

Circadian Rhythms-13

Coagulation-14

Cytokines/Growth Factors-52

Development-223

DNA-56

DNA Surveillance and Repair-42

Drug Design-17

Endocrine-66

Evolution-33

Extracellular Matrix-30

Gastroenterology-52

Gene Expression-178

Gene Therapy-53

Heart-61

Heat Shock Proteins-19

Hematology-11

Immunology-93

Infectious Disease-71

Ischemia-Reperfusion-33

Leptin and Leptin Antagonists-1

Medical-12

MHC-17

Mitochondria-17

Molecular Biology-13

Molecular Complexes and Signaling-1

Nanomedicine-30

Neurodegenerative Disease-72

Neuropharmacology-112

Neuroscience-38

Nucleus-15

Oncogenes-8

Oncology-87

Parasitic Disease-12

Pharmacogenomics-14

Prebiotic Evolution-2

Protein-12

Reproductive Biology-59

RNA-152

Signal Transduction-186

Stem Cells-80

Surgery-37

T-Cell Activation-12

Tissue Engineering-116

Transplant-51

Vaccines-82

Viruses-85

Chapter category: Agricultural Biotechnology

A Brief Story of Biosensor Technology

Chapter authors:
Marco Mascini

The vast literature in the last 40 years related to the keyword Biosensor reveals without doubt that the scientific field is attractive! We realized at once that several researchers with different background are involved in this field of research, from chemistry to physics, to microbiology and of course to electrical engineering, all are deeply involved in several facets of the assembly of the object “Biosensor”. Looking at the past we realize also that the concept of Biosensor has evolved! For some authors, especially at the beginning of this research activity, i.e., about 40 years ago, Biosensor is a self contained analytical device that responds to the concentration of chemical species in biological samples! This is clearly wrong, but it has been very difficult to clarify this point! No mention of a biological active material involved in the device! Thus any physical (thermometer) or chemical sensor (microelectrode implanted in animal tissue) operating in biological samples could be considered a Biosensor. We agree that a biosensor can be defined as a device that couples a biological sensing material (we can call it a molecular biological recognition element) associated with a transducer. In 1956 Professor Leland C. Clark publishes his paper on the development of an oxygen probe and based on this research activity he expanded the range of analytes that could be measured in 1962 in a Conference at a Symposium in the New York Academy of Sciences where he described how to make electrochemical sensors (pH, polarographic, potentiometric or conductometric) more intelligent by adding “enzyme transducers as membrane enclosed sandwiches”.1 The first example was illustrated by entrapping the enzyme Glucose Oxidase in a dialysis membrane over an oxygen probe. The addition of glucose determined the decrease of oxygen concentration in proportional relation! The first biosensor was described in the published paper coining the term “enzyme electrode”.2 Then subsequently in 1967 Updike and Hicks use the same term “enzyme electrode” to describe a similar device where again the enzyme glucose oxidase was immobilized in a polyacrylamide gel onto a surface of an oxygen electrode for the rapid and quantitative determination of glucose.3 Besides amperometry Guilbault and Montalvo in 1969 use glass electrodes coupled with urease to measure urea concentration by potentiometric measurement.4

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