Nanobiotechnology and its role in the development of new analytical devices

Physical methods of molecule observation and manipulation will prove useful, not only as research tools for investigating biomolecular structure and behavior, but also for the creation of nanostructures. Supramolecular and self-assembling structures are able to generate nanostructures, with many such systems being of biological origin. They form the interface between nanotechnology and biotechnology. Whereas biotechnological processes usually involve populations of cells or molecules, nanotechnological methods operate at the level of individual molecule manipulation. This article considers what advances have been made through cross-fertilisation between nanotechnology and biotechnology to develop for the next millennium new analytical tools at the microscale, using nanostructures as the sensitive part and with the ability to detect individual molecules.