Recent advances on nanozyme-based electrochemical biosensors for cancer biomarker detection

Abstract

Nanomaterials with intrinsic enzyme-mimicking activities (nanozymes) have emerged as pivotal components in diverse analytic areas. As an important branch, nanozyme-based electrochemical biosensors have experienced fast growth in recent years, based on the excellent enzyme-like catalytic performances and unique physicochemical characteristics of recently-engineered nanozymes. Electrochemical biosensors using nanozymes serving as signaling/amplifying tags or catalysts for generating/influencing the electroactive probes, have been recognized an efficient method for quantitative detection of biomarkers of interest, and among them, cancer biomarker detection holds much clinical significance. To highlight the research progress on using nanozymes in electrochemical biosensors for cancer biomarker detection, we discuss the development of nanozymes employed in electrochemical biosensors with their working mechanisms that underlie selective and sensitive identification of cancer biomarkers, which hold immense potential as point-of-care testing tools. Recent researches on the utilizations of conventional nanozymes as well as recently-emerging nanozymes, including metal-organic frameworks and MXenes, are also discussed to elucidate their sensing principles and synergistic contribution to enhance the electrochemical detection performances for cancer biomarkers. Current challenges and future directions of nanozyme-based electrochemical biosensing strategies for cancer biomarker detection are discussed, to suggest potent ways to achieve prognostics, diagnostics, and therapeutics monitoring of cancer and other diseases. © 2024 Elsevier B.V.