The nature of biosensor technology

The biosensor exploits the unique specificity of biological recognition events by coupling an enzyme, antibody or other biorecognition species to a transducing device. Interaction of the biocomponent with substrate or antigen is thus converted into a suitable quantitative output. The development of these biosensors is a multidisciplinary effort, exploiting many of the emerging semiconductor and optics technologies and integrating many traditional assay techniques. The impact of these biosensors is likely to be wide-ranging, with applications in medical and industrial environments as well as a variety of other fields.