Biotechnological Advances in Detection of Contaminants from Wastewater

Abstract

AbstractWastewater from industries causes major environmental pollution problems. The urban development and commercialization in developing countries cause deterioration of surface water resources. Hence, for its improvement, it is essential to develop highly sensitive devices with quick response for monitoring of wastewater contamination. In this respect, biotechnological processes such as biosensors can be promising and a robust option for detection of toxic pollutants. Biosensors can be applied in order to acquire real‐time quantitative data. Nowadays, the enzymes or whole cell bio‐reporters‐based biosensors have promising potential due to the possibility of miniaturization and opportunity for development of in situ biosensors. The growing need of convenient, rapid, and efficient biosensing devices explains the current advancement of biosensors with new transduction materials for multiplexed contaminant detection. Considering the extensive range of sensing strategies including immunochemical‐based, enzymatic and nonenzymatic signals, different kinds of biosensors can be classified as electrochemical, optical, thermal, etc. For the past few years, more attention has been paid to nanomaterial‐based biosensors which exhibit monitoring on the basis of chemical reactions and biological phenomena. Overall, this review focuses on principle and operation (transduction mechanism) of biosensors based on bio‐recognition elements, for the early detection of organic and inorganic contaminants existing in wastewater.