Molecular imprinting: A new tool for drug innovation.

Molecular imprinting is a rapidly evolving technique to prepare synthetic receptors. This paper discusses the opportunities to use such synthetic receptors for pharmaceutical applications, including separation, extraction and detection of drugs or their metabolites, and methods for drug screening, drug delivery and drug targeting. Molecularly imprinted polymers can be a valuable alternative for receptors of biological origin, such as antibodies, in terms of robustness, versatility and ease of preparation.: