“Plug and Play” diagnostic systems with optoelectronic nanosensors

Diagnostics are a vital component of the healthcare system and provide pivotal information influencing practitioners’ decisions regarding disease identification, treatment, and management. With advances in nanotechnology over the last few decades, nanotechnology-assisted diagnostics and nanosensors design have become an even more integral part of medical practice today, enabling, for example, more personalized and productive treatments and diseases prevention. As chemical and biological testing capabilities continue to evolve rapidly with the development of new technologies and more advanced approaches, certain concepts and techniques underpin reliable and effective clinical detections. One of these techniques is optical spectroscopy which has stood the test of time and is widely used to assess the effectiveness of old and emerging techniques, making it quite fundamental and immutable. Here, we discuss the optical and electrochemical systems of diagnostic testing and the nanotechnological progress in terms of processes and innovative materials being driven into diagnostic technologies today. Particularly, the emerging research that will lead to a new wave of “plug and play” diagnostic devices suitable for commercial optoelectronic nanobiosensors role with self-powered capabilities and point-of-care (POC) applications through the intervention of advanced functional nanomaterials.