Biosensors: Recent advances and mathematical challenges

This book is oriented to those applications of biosensors related to Food security and monitoring, Biomedical uses and Waste treatment. Although there is plenty of information about research in the design and fabrication of biosensors, there is little information about the limitations and concerns that take place whenever they want to be implemented as part of real world applications. In this sense, the book focuses in general and specific concerns from different fields to guide researches and companies working on biosensors and sensor systems to overview several problems that may and will have to overcome. The book is divided into several chapters that include a complete review of different strategies for the design and fabrication of biosensors and sensor systems for three main areas: Food security and monitoring, Biomedical applications and Waste treatment. In this chapters the reader can find information about the design, implementations techniques, biocompatibility of the different strategies, biomolecules used and biochemical paths that have succeed in the implementation of biosensors. Additional to this information, there is a part of the book concerning different biomedical challenges when applying sensor networks in real applications. This chapter will guide the reader to understand the importance of the statistical analysis prior the implementation, the proper way to calculate the true negative/false positives according the different biomedical experimental setups. Also, some important limitations that have to be taken into consideration when targeting biomedical uses. Another important issue is the one related to the packaging of biosensors depending on the final target. The possible interaction of the biosensors with recalcitrant and hazardous compounds in waste treatment, or the sterilize and biocompatible conditions needed for biomedical applications and food monitoring, take place in this part of the book where the reader can overview different material selections and strategies to confine, group and prepare biosensors for a long life cycle of operability and storage. The three areas analyzed in this book about the use of biosensors present several and critical limitations in terms of energy consumption. A part of the book is dedicated to those powering challenges presented in each type of application and thus, different strategies will be postulated to overcome energy use, power source generation and power management. Finally, the need of large quantities of biosensors and sensor networks in real world applications, as well as, biosensors integration are studied and analyzed in the last part of the of the book. Real world applications are not only limited to the implementation, but also, to the maintenance and operability of the sensor network; thus, the need for replacement and the verification of operation are without any doubt crucial to this type of applications. The propose content of the book is briefly described by this list - Biosensors for food security and monitoring - Biosensors for biomedical applications - Biosensors for waste treatment - Biomedical challenges for sensor network implementations - Packaging concerns for biosensors in hostile environments - Powering challenges for sensor networks and their applications - Biosensors integration and large production concerns