Recent advances on portable sensing and biosensing assays applied for detection of main chemical and biological pollutant agents in water samples: A critical review

The quality analysis of water, pharmaceutical and environmental compounds is a basic subject for human health. The presence of low-quality drugs, biological toxins and chemical compounds in water or forbidden additives in the nourishments lead to irreversible problems in human health. Hence, multiple analytical approaches have been presented for investigating the quality of environmental, pharmaceutical, and food compounds and monitoring the detection of toxic compounds and pollutants in water. Sensing tools based on analytical strategies are required for identifying and quantifying the different pollutants including biological and chemical contaminants in water samples. Among different biosensing and sensing tools, portable sensing assays are of special importance because of their great advantages such as simplicity, affordability, portability and ability to on-site detection. Therefore, during the last decades, designing and fabricating portable assays with great sensitivity and selectivity have been considered by many researchers and scientists for detection of various water pollutants. In this paper, the latest improvements in portable biosensors and sensors in the monitoring of biological and chemical pollutants in different samples of water are extensively explained. Initially, different portable sensing assays and novel technologies in their development are addressed. Then, by introducing various biological (bacteria, algae, toxins) and chemical pollutants (heavy metals, aromatic compounds, pesticides and insecticides), different portable sensors which have been developed for the detection of the pollutants are presented. Finally, upcoming perspectives and future challenges are thoroughly described.