Aptamer-based point-of-care-testing for small molecule targets: From aptamers to aptasensors, devices and applications

Point-of-care testing (POCT) represented the diagnosis performing at or near patient located site, has extended applications in healthcare, environmental safety, or food quality with low cost, easy to use, simple result interpretation and reliability. To meet the rapidly growing demand for onsite/portable analysis of various targets, aptamers have been utilized to improve the specificity of POCT, and such aptamer based POCT becomes popular in a wide range of promising applications. The quantification of small molecules derived from natural or pharmaceutical origin are important in many disciplines. Considering the significance of small molecules, limitation of laboratory resource and necessary of onsite detection, the construction and application of aptamer based POCT for various categories small molecules exhibited great significance. In this review, aptamer selection methods of small molecules, aptasensors design principle, different kinds of portable devices are summarized. Future version on aptamer selection, aptasensor design, high throughput and simultaneously detection were discussed.