Recent advances in nanoscale metal-organic frameworks (nanoMOFs) for electrochemical pharmaceutical sensing: a review

Electroanalytical methods have emerged as powerful alternatives for pharmaceutical compounds detection due to their high sensitivity, rapid response, portability, and cost-effectiveness. Among advanced functional materials, nanoscale metal-organic frameworks (nanoMOFs) have attracted increasing attention owing to their large surface area, tunable porosity, and intrinsic catalytic activity, which significantly enhance electrochemical sensor performance. This review provides a comprehensive and critical overview focused exclusively on nanoMOFs-based electroanalytical sensors for pharmaceutical detection, covering research papers published between 2016 and 2025. The literature is systematically analyzed and classified according to nanoMOF synthesis strategies, sensor architectures, electroanalytical techniques, and targeted pharmaceutical compounds. Key analytical performance parameters, including sensitivity, selectivity, detection limits, and operational stability, are comparatively discussed across pharmaceutical applications. Particular attention is given to hybrid sensor platforms integrating nanoMOFs with conductive polymers, carbon nanomaterials, and other functional components to improve signal transduction and selectivity. Finally, current challenges related to stability, reproducibility, scalability, and real-sample analysis are discussed, and future perspectives are outlined, highlighting the potential of nanoMOFs as key enabling materials for next-generation pharmaceutical monitoring and quality control.