Recent progress in bio-sensing techniques with encapsulated enzymes.

Biosensors with encapsulated enzymes have advantages of high substrate selectivity and sustained enzyme activity. Enzymes are encapsulated in various materials, such as liposome, polymer, and sol-gel or hydro-gel, depending on sensing conditions. By stabilizing the enzymes via encapsulation with new methods and materials the enzyme activity may be maintained for a longer time, and even the selectivity can possibly be enhanced. In general increased mass transfer limitation seems to be the major challenge to investigate more. Novel materials, encapsulation techniques, and sensing mechanisms have been studied intensively for encapsulated enzyme biosensors. In this review, we focus on the recent progress in encapsulated enzyme biosensors published in peer-reviewed journals over the last 10 years. The articles are categorized and reviewed in four groups based on encapsulation techniques incorporating with liposome, polymer, sol-gel or hydro-gel, and peptide. Research articles that are considered critical and noticeable are selected and compared according to these categorizations. Based on these article analyses, we suggested future direction in the encapsulated enzyme biosensor research. Copyright 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.